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8/24/2021

Please continue to follow the news on the flooding in western North Carolina. You can send the school districts in Transylvania and Haywood counties love via Twitter. We are with you!

An update from EdNC’s newest reporter, Anna Pogarcic:

The N.C. Community College System and UNC System officially entered into a teacher prep uniform articulation agreement on Monday that has been years in the making.

The agreement, system leaders say, will make education more accessible and affordable. It will allow students who have earned an Associate in Arts Teacher Preparation or an Associate in Science Teacher Preparation to smoothly transition to a UNC System school and earn their teacher’s license.

This is an effort to address the critical teacher shortage in the state, both system leaders said.

“We believe community colleges can be a part of the solution to the teacher shortage and assist in training teachers that not only come from our counties, but will remain in their communities once they graduate and become a certified teacher,” NCCCS President Thomas Stith said.

As of the agreement’s signing, 52 community colleges were participating alongside 15 UNC System schools.

This is one of the ways the two systems are collaborating to improve the transfer process, Stith said.

UNC System President Peter Hans highlighted the particular benefit this agreement could have for teachers from rural areas of the state.

“(Teachers are) making do the best they can, but that’s not enough for the young people of our state,” he said.

The two systems have agreements like this for other areas, like nursing, and Hans said he hopes to see more in the future.

“We’re serving the people of North Carolina,” Hans said. “That’s what the community college system exists to do — that’s what the university system exists to do.”

The teacher prep uniform articulation agreement goes into effect this fall.

For more postsecondary news from EdNC, sign up for our newsletter Awake 58, our weekly roundup of essential news and commentary on postsecondary education and community colleges.

In other news, Governor Cooper vetoed House Bill 729, the Charter School Omnibus bill. He said, “The State Board of Education is constitutionally and statutorily charged with administering children’s education in state public schools, including charter schools. It is critical that the Board have both of their appointments to the Charter School Advisory Board to carry out its constitutional duties.”

These are the sources EdNC checks every day: The New York Times, The 74, Education Week, The NC Tribune, The Insider, The News & Observer, The Charlotte Observer, WUNC, WFAE, Brookings, Education Commission of the States, and DPI’s News. A cross section of diverse sources are checked weekly and monthly. If you have an article you think needs to be included, email [email protected].


Mebane Rash

Mebane Rash is the CEO and editor-in-chief of EducationNC.


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