The development of certification in Georgia
has been a cooperative effort between the State Legislature,
Department of Education, teacher preparation institutions,
and the state professional teachers’ associations. The
first provisions requiring certificates of all teachers in
schools receiving funds from the State were found in the
school laws of 1858; however, certificates of qualification
to teach and be of "good moral character" were
issued by the county Board of Examiners. In 1887 the issuance
of a permanent state license by the State School Commissioner
was authorized, but it was not until 1924 that the State
Division of Certification was established.
In 1946 the dual system of state
certification and county certification was discontinued and
all teachers were required to hold a state teacher’s
certificate. Since that time, certification in Georgia has
seen many changes including increases in the requirements for
initial preparation, the addition of many new fields of
certification, new trends in alternative preparation,
developments in the initial and continuing assessment of
educators, and moves toward national trends in certification.
The variable that remains constant throughout this history,
however, is the continuous collaboration between the Division
of Certification, teacher preparation institutions, and the
educators of Georgia.
In July of 1991, a legislative mandate was
enacted which created the Professional Standards Commission
(PSC) as a separate government agency, removed from the
Georgia Department of Education, with the central
responsibility for establishing a certification/licensure
process that is streamlined, understandable, and flexible in
order to remove barriers and to attract qualified individuals
to the education profession. Specifically, the PSC’s
major purposes are: to simplify and make more efficient the
process of certifying educational personnel in Georgia; to
attract the highest possible number of qualified personnel to
become educators in Georgia; to promote the hiring of
qualified educators from other states; and to improve the
level of preparation of educators.
