Teacher Residency Partnership with Surry County Established
February 8, 2023
Teacher Residency Partnership with VCU School of Education
Established to Recruit and Prepare Teachers for Surry County
To help address the teacher shortage in Surry County, the VCU School of Education's RTR Residency Program (RTR) announces a new $155,000 investment in an innovative, school-based teacher preparation program partnership with Surry County Public Schools.
During the first year of the partnership, Surry County Public Schools will receive $50,000 to recruit and educate two provisionally licensed teachers. In addition, RTR will provide mentor training to Surry County Public School's master teachers, who will support these two provisionally licensed teachers as they complete clinical experiences as new teachers. In the second year of the partnership, RTR will increase funding to $100,000 to support the preparation of four additional teachers. In addition, VCU's Foundation Big Ideas grant funding will provide an additional $5,000 to support the partnership. The Virginia Department of Education has provided $16,000 in the form of an Apprenticeship Planning grant to support the development of long-term strategies aimed at increasing the number of licensed teachers who will work in Surry County Public Schools and two additional partner school divisions.
RTR will conduct an initial school division-wide training and induction in February to introduce the new Surry County Public Schools teacher residency program. Prospective teachers interested in learning more about RTR are invited to attend upcoming virtual information sessions. The schedule is posted on the VCU School of Education website at bit.ly/VCUEducationGraduateInfoSessions.
The VCU School of Education's RTR Residency is an intensive, school-based teacher preparation model that combines the best of traditional and alternate route teacher preparation programs, ensuring that candidates are well-prepared and profession-ready. RTR residents complete a VCU School of Education graduate program within one year while working alongside a master teacher in the area of choice. Prepared with curriculum, teaching methods, and child development knowledge while spending an entire year co-teaching with a carefully selected trainer and master/mentor teacher, residents experience a rigorous curriculum and challenging coursework while learning how to teach in a high-needs school. In addition, once hired as teachers of record, RTR graduates receive one-on-one mentoring for at least one hour a week from a highly-skilled, content-specific career coach.
Surry County Public Schools is hosting a virtual teacher recruitment fair for qualified teacher candidates from February 22 through 24. To register and submit an application (deadline February 17), prospective teachers may visit www.surryschools.net and click on the "Teach In Surry" tab.
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Pictured from left to right: Lora Baily, Ph.D., executive director of licensure and accreditation for the VCU School of Education; Serbrenia J. Sims, Ed.D, superintendent of Surry County Public Schools; Kim McKnight, Ph.D., director, VCU School of Education's Center for Teacher Leadership; and Mr. Giron Wooden, Jr.