Education Field Office

Education Field Office

ODU's Education Field Office organizes and administers all field and clinical experiences related to Ohio Dominican University’s teacher education programs.

Ohio Dominican partners with local school districts and teachers to provide quality and diverse field experiences for our future educators.

While in the classrooms of experienced mentor teachers, our students develop a context for learning, enhance their skills, reflect on dispositions for working with others, and relate theory to practice. 

The Division of Education strives to provide students with a variety of placements, including those in urban, suburban, rural and charter/private school settings. 

ODU’s Field Placement Coordinator and the school district administrators arrange all field and clinical placements.

Students working toward earning K-12 licensure (Visual Arts, TESOL, IS) are required to have field experiences in a variety of grade levels even if plan to teach at a specific level. 

Students completing field/clinical placements will work with licensed educators in at least his/her third year of teaching. District administrators recommend cooperating teachers to be capable and willing mentors.

  • Students are not permitted to contact schools directly to request placements.
  • Students are responsible for providing their own transportation to all field/clinical placements.
  • ODU pre-service teachers are not permitted to complete student teaching placements in buildings where immediate family members attend or are employed.
  • Students planning to student teach must complete an Application for Student Teaching in Tk20, the semester prior to student teaching.

Students who plan to student teach in a field/clinical placement during the fall semester must complete an application during the end of February/early March the previous spring semester. 

For those students teaching in the spring, the application should be completed in early October. 

Please submit in writing any special requests. 

The State of Ohio requires education students who participate in field/clinical experiences to have a Pre-Service Teaching Permit, issued by the State Board of Education. 

Pre-Service Teaching Permits are available as 1-year ($25) or 3-year permits ($75).

Ohio law requires all individuals to have a baseline BCI and FBI criminal background check at the time they apply for their first Ohio educator license, certificate or permit. ODU brings a provider on campus at the beginning of the Fall and Spring Semesters to facilitate fingerprinting. The cost of fingerprinting is $65.

The Ohio Department of Education does not accept paper copies. All background check reports must be submitted electronically directly from the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Therefore, when students complete their background checks, they are to check the Ohio Department of Education box under the ‘Reason Fingerprinted’ part of the application.

Use code 3319.29.   

Students are responsible for the cost associated with having their criminal background checks and Pre-Service Teaching Permit. Students with previous convictions can access this link to the Ohio Department of Education to see if they are eligible to obtain a teaching license in the State of Ohio.

Hard copies of the FBI/BCII background checks should be mailed to:

Ohio Dominican University
Attn: Melinda Reames
Division of Education
1216 Sunbury Road
Columbus, OH 43219

Education Majors at ODU