VCU news

By VCU News staff

The Virginia Commonwealth University School of Education has been awarded a Virginia Department of Education grant to develop teacher apprentice residency programs in partnership with the school systems in Prince William County, Fairfax County and Surry County.

The grant is one of nine awarded to Virginia universities to allow school divisions to hire classroom aides, paraprofessionals, substitutes and other unlicensed school employees as teacher apprentices and provide a mentored pathway for them to complete the coursework required to become fully licensed teachers.

In November 2021, the U.S. Department of Labor approved K-12 teaching as an “apprenticeable” occupation, qualifying teacher apprentice programs for funding through several federal workforce-development grants administered by the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry, according to the Virginia Department of Education.

At VCU, the project will be led by RTR Teacher Residency, a school-based teacher preparation program that integrates research with practice to equip residents with the knowledge, skills and experience to be effective in high-needs and hard-to-staff classrooms.

Kim McKnight, Ph.D., executive director of RTR Teacher Residency and director of the Center for Teacher Leadership, said the grant will enable the recruitment, support and retention of high-quality teachers and teacher leaders for the hardest-to-staff schools in the partner divisions.

McKnight said 20 or more participants are expected across the three partner school divisions. Planning for the program is expected to wrap up by June 2023.

Shelby G. Elliott, administrative coordinator, certification and compliance, in the Department of Human Resources for Prince William County Public Schools, said PWCS is excited to work with VCU and the other two school divisions to pilot a multitiered apprentice residency teacher program.

“We believe that this new apprentice residency teacher model will transform the teaching profession and turn the tide on the educator shortage in Virginia,” Elliott said. “We are actively designing a program that will offer potential candidates a paid apprenticeship/residency where they can ‘earn to learn.’  By removing the financial and teacher preparation barriers, we hope to expand the pipeline of potential applicants and provide structured on-the-job training that will result in the recruitment and retention of highly qualified and prepared educators.”

VCU’s RTR program is the longest-standing teacher residency program in Virginia and one of the most successful in the country, Elliott added. “With this new partnership, we hope to build upon [RTR’s] highly successful current residency model and offer a multitiered apprenticeship/residency option that will allow candidates to either complete a bachelor’s degree, post-bachelor’s, master’s or post-master’s certificate.”