My name, as you already know, is Ray(mond) Ostrander. I am employed as an Associate Professor of Teaching, Learning, and Curriculum (TLC) at Andrews University. My raison d'être is the teaching of pre service and inservice teachers in the English/Language Arts, particularly the components of writing process, content area reading, and developmental reading. My current teaching responsibilities include, but are not limited to, Content Area Reading Methods, Social Studies Methods, Improving Instruction, Language Arts Methods, Developmental Reading Methods, and various Instructional Technology courses, as well as the supervision of student teachers and directorship of the Master’s of Arts, Teaching (MAT) program. I have been an Andrews Teacher Education faculty for the last eleven years.

Over the years I have heard numerous education majors complain that the professors from whom they took methods courses had no practical, first hand classroom experience. I was one such student. "Theory is wonderful, but show me how you've applied it!" So, early on, with the goal of actually being a college/university teacher some day, I sought real life, classroom teaching experiences. I taught, among other disciplines, the English Language Arts in elementary and secondary schools for seventeen years, including Glenview Junior (Glendale, Arizona), Nevada (Missouri) Elementary, Sunnydale Academy (Centralia, Missouri), and College View Academy (Lincoln, Nebraska). During these years I taught writing in many types of classrooms, including multi age/multi grade classrooms and self contained classrooms. I have also taught writing classes at Union College in Lincoln, Nebraska. This experiential background enables me to bring to my teacher training classrooms a thorough understanding of instructional and student needs at K-12 levels.

My undergraduate emphasis was in English and music (BA), most of which I studied at Pacific Union College. I received a MS from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in English Education. My Ph.D. was acquired at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, in the inner departmental area of Administration, Curriculum, and Instruction.

About Me