From the article –

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2019 in review:

• 30,000+ people applied to become a teacher through our program
• 15,000+ people enrolled in a Teachers of Tomorrow program
• 7,000+ new teachers were hired through our certification program

Like I said, a pretty incredible year and there is more exciting news coming in 2020. We have worked hard to create a very solid pipeline of great potential teacher candidates so that the number of new teachers hired through Teachers of Tomorrow  continues to grow, even as the rest of educator preparation in the United States is shrinking.

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And it’s not just enrollment.  There were 28% fewer graduates from educator preparation program over that same time frame.  The only bright spot is alternative certification programs which showed a significant increase in enrollment in a few key states – like Texas.

Here are the problems as highlighted by the paper –

• There are 1/3 fewer students enrolling in teacher preparation programs in 2018 than in 2010
• If you take out alternative certification – the enrollment declined by 43%
• There are 28% fewer students completing teacher preparation program sin 2018 than in 2010
• 80% of educator enrollment identify as white
• 77% of teachers are female
• Declines in enrollment hit every race

Here is the bright spot

• Alternative preparation programs that are not based in higher education experience a 42% increase in enrollment – which drove a slight uptick in the national enrollment in preparation programs
• Of the 19,158 completers from alternative certification, 12,243 were from Texas. Of that, 6,022 were from Texas Teachers of Tomorrow. We account for 49% of the Texas total and 31% of the National total of teachers certified through alternative certification.
• Men and African American enrollment increased in Texas
• Most states saw an increase in enrollment of Latinx Teachers

The author then profiles two states – Texas and California.  She points out, correctly, that our enrollment has rapidly increased while our completion has not. This is because we have rolling enrollment that only expires after three years. Because we attract career changers into teaching the convenience of completing the program on their own time is critical in recruitment.

She is also the first to point out that there is a study that our teachers performed as well as traditionally trained teachers as it relates to student achievement.  She left out one of the more impressive stats – 72% of our teachers are still teaching after 5 years – an incredible retention rate.

She is also correct – many people enroll and do not complete. They find teaching is not right for them and never apply for a job.  This is a good thing.  The low cost to entry means we attract more people – but some realize this is not the career for them.

The negative she points out is there are some other studies and the union is not fond of alt cert.

So Texas has all these programs – mainly Texas Teachers – and we have rapidly increasing enrollment and very few teacher shortages. Then she highlights California which she seems to support which is doing the usual – scholarships, residency programs, STEM recruiting etc – but she doesn’t point out any impact from these programs. And when you look at the graph, California has had a 48% decline in enrollment in educator preparation programs.

We are very proud of the impact we have had.  We have placed over 7,000 teachers so far this year in 8 states.

And we are just getting started.

The post Rapidly Declining Enrollment in Teacher Preparation – Except Texas! appeared first on Teachers of Tomorrow.

Reciprocity for teachers is getting easier, but if you have always wanted to teach in Nevada or Michigan or South Carolina, there has never been a better time to work with us to start your teaching career.

Our expert advisors help you navigate the teacher certification rules in any of the states where we are now approved.

• Texas Teachers
• Florida Teachers of Tomorrow
• Nevada Teachers of Tomorrow
• South Carolina Teachers of Tomorrow
• Indiana Teachers of Tomorrow
• Michigan Teachers of Tomorrow
• Arizona Teachers of Tomorrow

Unlike other programs, we have a state director on the ground in each of these states to make sure we know what our school districts need and to make sure our teachers get hired! We have changed rules in many of these states to remove barriers to the classroom so great people don’t get discouraged and abandon their dream of becoming a teacher.

It is not easy to become an approved educator preparation program in 8 states in 2 years – but we did it. And we did it for one reason – to make sure that every student has a great teacher.

Are you ready to teach?

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The Shortage is increasing! 

[i]

Why are there so many open positions?

• Florida students graduating with an education degree has fallen by nearly 5,000 since 2006.[ii]
• In 2008, there were 9,012 education program completers, by 2015 it was down to 5,612 – a 38% drop
• In 2014, 2,477 teachers came from out of state and in just one year that more than doubled to 5,124 teachers from out of state – but Florida cannot depend on other states for its teacher[iii]
• Public school enrollment has grown from 2.6 million in 2008 to 2.8 million in 2015 [iv]

Can alternative certification help?

• Texas does not have a shortage and more than 50% of its teachers come from– and those teachers have a 70% 5 year retention rate. As education majors dropped, alternative certification increased to cover that drop
• Florida only gets 32% of its teachers from alternative certification – and that percentage has stayed constant. As education majors dropped, so did the numbers completing alternative certification.
• Florida Teachers of Tomorrow has had over 2,400 applicants in the program but only 160 have been admitted – this is due to the length of time it takes to get an SOE, people lose interest, as well as the confusing array of options that result in people not completing a given route.

 Why?

• Delays from FLDOE – it is taking up to 6 months for a person to get their Statement of Eligibility (SOE) to teach – we see this first hand with Florida Teachers of Tomorrow
• Alternative certification teachers don’t complete a program – 35% of Temp Certificate teachers in Florida do not move on to a professional certificate. We lose way too many teachers through the alternative route. [v]
• General Knowledge Test – alternative certification teachers demonstrate general knowledge while enrolled in their program. Over 1,040 teacher are out of a job after failing state tests in spite of effective evaluations.[vi] But those enrolled in an EPI had a 31% greater pass rate than those not enrolled. [vii]

Bottom line: current certification rule makes it easy to get into teaching but 35% will leave teaching because they don’t finish a program.  We have to stop the outflow of teachers.

[i] Florida’s teacher shortage is ‘real and its going to get worse’, State Board of Ed member worries, Gradebook, Tampa Bay Times August 18, 2018

[ii] Florida School districts wrestle with teacher shortage, Orlando Sentinel, February 10, 2017

[iii] U.S. Department of Education Title II Reports for 2015-2016,

[iv] Datacenter Kidscount, Florida state student enrollment

[v] Teacher Recruitment and Retention Presentation to the State Board of Education, August 2016

[vi] At least 1,040 FL teachers out of jobs after failing state test, despite ‘effective’ evaluations, ABC Action News Tampa Bay, August 1, 2018

[vii] Florida State Board of Education powerpoint presentation from Bureau of Postsecondary Assessment, March 2, 2016

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The current open teaching positions in South Carolina are 160 vacancies in Lexington and Richland counties, 2 teacher vacancies in Beaufort county and 9 teacher vacancies in Kershaw county. There are many more, but this is all that is reported by the state.  Last year, there were over 550 teacher vacancies at the start of the school year and with just two weeks left until the start of school, it looks like 2018 will be worse.

One reason is the end of the Teacher Employee Retirement Incentive Program or TERI. But this is just part of the problem. According to CERRA which has the best data on teacher shortages and production than any other state, 4,800 teachers left teaching last year and only 1,898 students graduated from higher education programs.  And enrollment in educator preparation in South Carolina is down 22.4% in just 3 years.

We recently started our work in South Carolina as South Carolina Teachers of Tomorrow to provide more teachers to help alleviate this critical teaching shortage and we have over 100 candidates ready to go for this school year.  But we could have so many more – we have had over 2,300 applicants but many do not qualify under existing rule. We have worked together with the South Carolina Department of Education to ensure that many more can qualify and it has helped considerably. We are pushing to implement those changes that have significantly improved the teacher pipeline.

But there are a few more things we can do:

1. Allow all alternative certification programs to certify in Elementary Education since it is now a significant shortage area
2. Utilize the South Carolina Praxis II subject matter tests as the sole factor in determining subject matter knowledge.

Those two simple things will definitely allow more of our extensive applicant pool to become South Carolina Teachers soon!  It is a great state with some really great schools and great people who want to work in those schools.  We will continue to push to make that happen!

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People enrolled in Lateral Entry will be allowed to finish the program but all future licenses will be from Residency Licenses. North Carolina also established more more robust Educator Preparation Program requirements and reporting so that they could better manage the programs serving North Carolina Schools.

What does that mean for us? We have submitted an application to the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction so that we can begin helping solve the North Carolina teacher shortage in the very near future.

More to come – but we are eager to get started as we had over 200 North Carolinians apply to be in our South Carolina Teachers of Tomorrow program – so we know there are people willing to teach!

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LANSING, MI (April 5, 2018) – Governor Snyder signed Senate Bill 727 today that will help increase the number of qualified teachers that could interview for teaching positions this year. The bill, authored by state Senator Phil Pavlov, will eliminate an unnecessary barrier in the teacher licensing process and increase flexibility for educator preparation programs. The legislature moved quickly to pass this bill knowing it could have an impact on the teacher shortage this fall.

“Great schools start with great teachers,” stated Senator Pavlov Chairman of the Senate Education Committee. “To have great teachers we have to streamline the licensing process to facilitate recruitment of the best and brightest into our classrooms. Our students deserve the best and this new law will ensure more of Michigan’s most talented professionals are there to inspire the next generation.”

The bill ensures that people who apply to become a teacher through the Michigan Alternate Route to Interim Teaching (MARITC) will no longer have to take the new SAT at a local high school to qualify for a program. Since prospective teachers earning certification through MARITC must have a bachelor’s degree or higher, passing the SAT was an unnecessary step in the process that lengthened the time and increased the cost for certification. The bill also allows programs more flexibility with respect to the grade point average of prospective teachers who are offered admission.

“We want bright and knowledgeable teachers in Michigan classrooms and many schools have an immediate need to fill shortages in their districts,” said State Superintendent Brian Whiston. “This new law will remove a current barrier to help those wanting to become inspired teachers, share their first-hand expertise with students, and help Michigan become a Top 10 education state in 10 years.”

Michigan Teachers of Tomorrow was one of the MARITC programs helping drive the change. The program had more than 1,000 applicants who wanted to teach in Michigan schools in the first six months of operations. Most of those applicants were significantly slowed or stopped by the cost and time to take the SAT. The removal of the requirement means that many more potential teachers will be ready to staff Michigan schools this summer through the program. Most MARITC teachers are career changers, with an average age of 30+, who have now found the calling to teach.

Heidi Turchan, a reading instructor in Michigan stated, “My 20 years of experience and my level of expertise to teach reading to at-risk students is needed in our schools and it’s needed NOW! With the passing of SB 727, I can finally begin the Michigan Teachers of Tomorrow program to earn my teacher certificate and start teaching our lowest performing students to read!”

Senate Bill 727 was introduced on December 13, 2017 and passed out of legislature on March 22, 2018.  Companion legislation has been introduced to eliminate similar barriers in other programs besides the MARITC programs.

“We are proud to work with great leaders who see a problem like this barrier to the classroom and immediately work to resolve it,” stated Vernon Reaser, CEO of Teachers of Tomorrow. “In the end it means that many more classrooms will have a great teacher this fall which is always our goal.”

“The impact of the passage of SB 727 is immediate so that teachers can complete their program before the Fall,” said Erica House, another Michigan teacher impacted by the previous rule. “The passage of SB 727 is a huge victory towards ending Michigan’s teacher shortage. All schools, and especially urban schools, will directly benefit from having more qualified teachers available to them. Now let’s get to work filling those vacancies!”

About Teachers of Tomorrow (www.teachersoftomorrow.org)

Teachers of Tomorrow is the largest, fastest growing Teacher Certification Program in the nation, delivering online training to individuals who want to pursue a career in teaching. Teachers of Tomorrow attracts career changers with an average age of 32 into teaching so they can bring their real-world experiences into the classroom. Teachers of Tomorrow is the second most diverse certification program in the country with 46% non-white enrollment. In Addition, 70% of Teachers of Tomorrow teachers remain in the profession after five years, significantly higher than the national average of only 50%. Over the last 11 years, Teachers of Tomorrow has certified more than 42,000 new teachers, and in 2016 the Company trained and certified more than 7,000 teachers. An independent study revealed that Teachers of Tomorrow graduates see student achievement results equal to teachers coming through university programs. Teachers of Tomorrow is an approved teacher certification provider in Texas, Florida, Nevada, Indiana, South Carolina, Michigan and Arizona.

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“The best teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.” -Alexandra K.Trenfor 

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” -Nelson Mandela 

“A good education can change anyone, a good teacher can change everything.” 

“Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” -Margaret Mead 

“Having hope will give you courage.” 

The post Why I Became a Teacher (Inspirational Quotes) appeared first on Teachers of Tomorrow.

There are a lot of people asking this lately and some state leaders are pushing to eliminate certification while others are pushing to make it harder to become a teacher.  Those who work hard to make sure every class has a great teacher are caught in the middle.

The author is right to point out that alternative certification does attract more diverse candidates into teaching and that there are studies that show that teachers from alternative certification perform as well as teachers from other routes when it comes to student achievement.  But it is a pretty big leap from different routes creating teachers of equal quality to eliminating certification altogether.

Texas recently implemented much tougher restrictions on teacher certification programs while Arizona loosened theirs. Utah let districts decide who to hire and control certification but after just nine months is working to tighten those rules again – but still make it better for potential teachers.  Louisiana drastically changed their teacher certification requirements to make it much tougher on teachers. And Florida is all over the map.

But there is no data to make any of these changes. We are relying on “best practice”.  What we will see is decreased diversity and greater teacher shortages in states that rely on best practice to make it much tougher for potential teachers.  We will have much tougher rules using “best practice” and more long term subs teaching students.

So on paper you tougher rules but in reality you have less qualified teachers – is that really a win?

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The purpose of the Advisory Board is to provide counsel to the Board of Directors and Founder / CEO of Teachers of Tomorrow on strategy with particular emphasis on providing perspective and relationships with respect to improving teacher quality and effectiveness as well as new state expansion, and regulatory and industry trends.

The Advisory Board will be composed of a diverse group of individuals from the academic, business leadership, education policy, and political arenas. In conjunction with the formation of the Advisory Board the following individuals have been selected as inaugural members.

• David Driscoll – 22^nd Commissioner of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts; Former Chair of National Assessment Governing Board
• Jim Konantz – Former Assistant Superintendent, Los Angeles Unified School District; Senior Vice President of Education Initiatives, K12 Inc.
• Tom Luna – Senior Vice President and Chief Policy Officer of “Project Lead the Way”; Former Superintendent of Public Instruction in Idaho; Former Advisor to U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige
• Robert Scott – Former Texas Commissioner of Education and Head of the Texas Education Agency (“TEA”)
• Florence Shapiro – Former Member of Texas Senate representing North Dallas; Chaired the Texas Senate Education Committee for 10 years
• Jane Swift – CEO of Middlebury Interactive Languages; Former Governor for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
• Paul Vallas – Former Superintendent of the Bridgeport Public Schools; Former Superintendent of the Recovery School District of Louisiana; and Former CEO of the School District of Philadelphia and Chicago Public Schools

“The Teachers of Tomorrow Advisory Board will help us strengthen our operations and better serve both our customers and school districts who seek talented and diverse teachers to lead their classrooms and drive student achievement,” said William Hansen, President and CEO of USA Funds, Former Deputy U.S. Secretary of Education, and Current Board Member of Teachers of Tomorrow.

About Teachers of Tomorrow (www.teachersoftomorrow.org)

Teachers of Tomorrow is the largest, fastest growing Teacher Certification Program in the country, delivering online and in-person training to individuals pursuing a career in teaching. Teachers of Tomorrow is also the #2 most diverse ACP in the country with 46% non-white enrollment. The Company offers a strong value proposition to new teachers and school districts that are seeking to hire highly qualified candidates. Over the last 10 years, Texas Teachers has certified over 35,000 new teachers, and in 2016 the Company trained and certified over 7,000 teachers. In 2015, two teachers trained by Teachers of Tomorrow were nominated for the prestigious 2015 Presidential Awards for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching (PAEMST).  In 2016 the White House announced one of these teachers was selected as a winner for the state of Texas. These are the highest national awards mathematics and science teachers for exceptional teaching.

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• During the 2015-16 school year, there was a national shortage of about 60,000 teachers
• Across the country, half of all schools, and 90 percent of high-poverty schools, have experienced a teacher shortage
• If current trends persist, the group estimates that annual shortfall could grow to 112,000 teachers by 2018
• The need for more educators continuing to grow well into the 2020s.

The shortages are being driven by both an increase in demand and a decrease in supply – teacher attrition rates are high and teacher-preparation program enrollments have fallen 35 percent nationwide in the last five years. Career changers are the perfect answer to this problem and our programs are the most efficient and effective way for career changers to get into the classroom.

Please click below to find your classroom!

• Texas Teachers
• Florida Teachers
• Michigan Teachers
• Nevada Teachers
• Arizona Teachers

If you want to teach in the high needs areas like special education, bi-lingual, science and math or hard to staff schools – you will be in high demand. There is no better time to get into teaching with the one program that truly helps you get there.

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