Among the proposed responses if not solutions to the variously identified problems of U.S. education and teacher education is the creation of clinical faculty positions in teacher-education programs. Clinical faculty are outstanding, experienced elementary and secondary school teachers who work with college and university teacher-education programs. In this article, we examine the roles and relationships of clinical faculty in university teacher-education programs to understand better (a) how clinical faculty might contribute to the improvement of teacher education, and (b) obstacles to clinical faculty becoming a regular part of teacher-education programs. We begin by surveying the current roles of clinical faculty and their relationships with other players in teacher-education programs. Then we sketch a brief history of clinical faculty to provide perspective on the present. We conclude by critically reexamining roles and relationships and by considering implications for teacher-education reform with emphasis on the obstacles to institutionalization of clinical faculty programs.

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Although many high school drop-outs share a history of academic failure and truancy behaviour, their underlying reasons for leaving school are far more complex, and involve a web of both personal and school-related problems. Interviews with drop-outs from a working class high school in the USA revealed how the school's response, or lack of response, to their problems compounds their difficulties and creates a tension over the source of blame for their failure. On the one hand, these adolescents criticised the school for its failings, but on the other hand, they attributed much of their failure to themselves.In resolving this issue of blame, these suburban white drop-outs, in contrast to innercity minority youth, indicated that, ultimately, they themselves must be at fault for failing to conform to the expectations and demands of school. An explanation for this difference is offered by contrasting their lack of collective identity with the racial consciousness of African American drop-outs.