New fellowship program draws STEM majors to teaching in public schools

Ten recent graduates or professionals in mathematics and science have returned to classes at the University of Georgia this fall to become future math and science teachers in Georgia’s public schools, thanks to a new scholarship program in the UGA College of Education, funded by nearly $1 million in federal grants.

The Noyce Fellows program provides scholarships and stipends for science, technology, engineering and mathematics majors and professionals to attain a teaching certificate or a graduate education degree in exchange for a two-year commitment to teach in a high-needs public school in Georgia.

The program, based in the college’s department of mathematics and science education, was originally funded by a four-year, $750,000 National Science Foundation grant which will support three cohorts of 10 fellows each to complete teacher certification and a Masters of Arts in Teaching degree.

Now, the NSF has awarded the department an additional $150,000 to support four more scholars per cohort, thanks to funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Those four fellows will be added in January to the original 10 who began the program this fall. A second cohort will start in summer or fall 2010 and a third will begin in summer or fall 2011.

“The program is helping us attract highly qualified individuals to teacher careers in science and mathematics to overcome the teaching shortage in these critical fields,” said Denise Mewborn, principal investigator and head of the department of mathematics and science education. “Many of these individuals are giving up lucrative jobs to change careers, so the support the fellowship provides is essential.”

The fellows, who range from recent college graduates to those with years in the workplace, have found themselves drawn to the world of teaching.

Courtney Boehlke, a fellow in this year’s cohort, worked for nine years as a research technician and coordinator for a large lab in UGA’s cell biology department.

“I recently took a good look at what I felt was the most rewarding part of my job,” said Boehlke, who earned a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and molecular biology from UGA. “I enjoyed my role as a teacher most. I find my greatest fulfillment in sharing my knowledge with others and seeing their faces when they understand a difficult concept. It is my hope that my career change will allow me to move out of the lab and to pass on my passion for science and learning to future generations of scientists.”

After tutoring college students in mathematics for five years, Priscilla Alexander, a recent graduate of Paine College in Augusta, changed her career plans because she recognized a need for more qualified math teachers in high school classrooms.

“I earned my undergraduate degree in mathematics and planned to pursue a Ph.D. in mathematics, but I decided that mathematics education would be more conducive to my career goals,” said Alexander. “Most of all, I want to make a change when it comes to educating future mathematicians.”

Jamie York began to question her career goals after three years as an engineer. She took a strategic approach by researching potential careers and talking with more than 30 people in the teaching field.

“My desire is for a career that has a lasting impact, not simply a bottom line,” said York, who has a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering from Georgia Tech. “I also have a growing desire to work with youth, specifically those at risk. Having spent time volunteering with tutoring programs, at-risk youth mentoring programs, and high school discipleship groups, this desire has only continued to grow over the years. Finding a career path that integrated both my passion and my skill set was exactly what I was looking for.”

The fellowship provides financial support, including tuition, fees and a stipend of $4,000 to cover living expenses and books, for gaining certification to teach secondary mathematics or science as well as a graduate degree in those fields.The fellows will proceed through a carefully structured four-semester (summer-fall-spring-summer) program designed to help them develop subject matter knowledge for teaching and implement that knowledge in diverse school settings.

The Robert Noyce Scholarship program has funded four similar fellowship programs in Georgia at Clark Atlanta, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, and Kennesaw State universities.There are about 250 of these programs across the nation, ranging from $60,000 to $1.8 million.

For more information on the Noyce Fellowship Program at UGA, see www.coe.uga.edu/mse/nsf_info.html.

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Georgia HB 251 Provides Public School Choices Within Local Systems

Excerpts from the Georgia Department of Education on the framework of HB 251:

Under a new law signed by Governor Perdue, parents of K-12 public school students in Georgia now have the option to enroll their child in any school within the local school district in which they now reside. The new law requires, among other things, that each school district establish a universal, streamlined process to manage such transfers by July 1, 2009.

This framework and the attached documents are provided to districts to help implement this process and to assist districts in determining whether current permissive school choice policies may satisfy the statutory requirements.

A. House Bill 251
The law itself has three distinct features:
-A parent/guardian can elect to send a child to another public school in the same school district as long as there is classroom space available at the school after its assigned students have been enrolled;
-If a parent elects to exercise this choice option, the parent assumes all costs associated with transporting the child to and from the selected school; and
-A student who transfers to another school pursuant to this law may, at his or her election, continue to attend such school until the student completes all grades of the school.
Note:
• Local school districts should create a prioritized list for student transfers consistent with Federal and State laws.

Students eligible for transfer under the unsafe school choice option (USCO) and students in Needs Improvement (NI) schools that must offer public school choice under No Child Left Behind, must get first priority for available seats at those schools in the district that are not in needs improvement.

If a parent requests a transfer to a school that does not have the services required by the current
Individualized Education Plan (IEP) or Individualized Accommodation Plan (IAP), nothing in this framework requires the school to develop those services as long as they are available within the local school district.

Existing Georgia law already creates certain enrollment preferences. For instance, twins are given a statutory right to be enrolled in schools with their siblings, consistent with local policies. HB 251 should be construed in light of this and other existing law. As a result, districts may determine enrollment priorities, provided they do so in accordance with the provision of the HB 251.

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Inflation Continues to Outpace Teacher Salary Growth

Teachers across the nation are continuing to lose spending power for themselves and their families as inflation continued to outpace teacher salaries last year, according to the National Education Association's update to the annual report Rankings and Estimates: Rankings of the States 2008 and Estimates of School Statistics 2009.

Over the decade from 1997-98 to 2007-08, in constant dollars, average salaries for public schoolteachers declined 1 percent while inflation increased 31.4 percent. Twenty-six states and the District of Columbia saw real declines in average teacher salaries over those years, adjusting for inflation.

"Public schoolteachers deserve professional pay for professional work," said NEA President Dennis Van Roekel. "If we are going to close the achievement gaps, reduce school dropouts and recruit and retain highly qualified teachers, we need to compensate teachers across the country fairly for the work they do."

According to the report, the average one-year increase in public schoolteacher salaries was 3.1 percent, while inflation increased 4.3 percent. The national average public schoolteacher salary for 2007-2008 was $52,308. State average public schoolteacher salaries ranged from those in California ($64,424), New York ($62,332) and Connecticut ($61,976) at the high end, to South Dakota ($36,674), North Dakota ($40,279) and Utah ($41,615) at the low end.

Rankings and Estimates provides statistics to raise public understanding of key issues affecting teaching and learning conditions in the nation's public schools. Teacher salaries and public education indicators including school enrollment, student-teacher ratios and school funding at the local, state and federal levels are reported in the annual state-by-state report. Among the other highlights:

" Public school enrollment - Public school enrollment was 48,949,723 million, up 0.3 percent over fall 2006. The largest percentage enrollment increases from fall 2006 to fall 2007 were in Nevada (3.5 percent), Arizona (2.5 percent), Delaware (2.1 percent) and Ohio (2.1 percent). Twenty states and the District of Columbia experienced declines in student enrollment in fall 2007. The greatest declines were in the District of Columbia (-3.6 percent), Michigan (-2.6 percent), Vermont (-2.0 percent) and North Dakota (-1.6 percent).
" Gender diversity in teaching - Males comprised 24.5 percent of public schoolteachers in 2008. Many of them taught in Kansas (33.6 percent), Oregon (31.6 percent), Alaska (30.9 percent) or Indiana (30.5 percent). States with the lowest percentage of male faculty were Arkansas (16.2 percent), Virginia (17.4 percent), Mississippi (17.5 percent), Louisiana (18 percent), South Carolina (18.5 percent) and Georgia (19.7 percent).
" Expenditures per student - The U.S. average per student expenditure for public elementary and secondary schools in 2007-08 fall enrollment was $9,963. States with the highest per student expenditures were New Jersey ($15,374), New York ($15,286), Vermont ($14,336), Wyoming ($13,967) and Massachusetts ($13,768). Arizona ($5,346), Utah ($5,734), Nevada ($7,133), Mississippi ($7, 175) and Idaho ($7, 305) had the lowest per student expenditures.
Rankings and Estimates has presented selected education statistics since the 1960s. The complete report can be found at http://www.nea.org/edstats/images/rankings08.pdf

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