Teach For America Offers Hispanics the Opportunity to Have a Positive Impact in Their Community

/PRNewswire/ -- Teach For America, the prestigious national team of teachers, announced today that it will soon end their selection period for new teachers for the 2010-2011 school year. The final deadline for submitting applications is February 19, 2010. Those interested can obtain information about requirements and present their applications online at www.teachforamerica.org.

Teach For America is a non-profit organization whose goal is to eradicate inequality in education through the recruitment and training of professionals and outstanding recent college graduates from all backgrounds and professional areas. The organization offers them an excellent opportunity to help their communities while at the same time allowing them to obtain a full-time job with a competitive salary, health benefits, financial support and training in different areas to ensure their success as educators and offer them the tools to become leaders and highly qualified professionals inside or outside the field of education. Additionally, becoming a member of Teach For America carries great prestige. BusinessWeek's 2009 ranking of "Best Places to Launch a Career" Teach For America came in at #7 and for the third year in a row was the top ranked non-profit organization.

Teach For America seeks individuals from all origins who have demonstrated leadership skills, high achievement in academic and extracurricular activities as well as in their work and family responsibilities. They will dedicate themselves to teaching in public schools, both in urban and rural areas, for a period of two years, offering the students in these low income communities, such as Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Chicago and Dallas, the opportunity to receive a high standard of education that is comparable to that found in schools in higher-income communities.

This 2009-2010 school year, Teach For America placed more than 4,000 new teachers in public schools in low-income communities across the country, representing the largest incoming corps in its history. They are now teaching in 35 urban and rural regions in over 100 school districts in 27 states and the District of Columbia. Some 7.3% identified themselves as Hispanic or Latino, which represents an increase of over 1.3% compared with the previous school year.

Although students in low-income communities have the potential to reach the same academic levels as those students in more affluent communities, they confront additional challenges associated with growing up in poverty. On average at a national level, nine year-old students who live in low-income communities are academically three grade levels below students who live in high-income communities. Only 50% of these low-income students will graduate from high school, and those who do, on average, perform on an eighth-grade level. Only one in every 10 of these students will obtain a college degree. This considerably affects Hispanic students, who are three times as likely to live in low-income communities.

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