Start and Stay at White Mountains Community College for Your Teaching Degree
Katharine Eneguess, President of White Mountains Community CollegeThe other day I had a conversation with a young man in his mid-20s who has a biology degree from a state college. He told me he could have gotten a job in a lab in Boston and could be making lots of money, but he would have to leave the mountains. Instead he was putting his career on hold, working in the hospitality industry. The hospitality industry can provide good careers for young people, but it's not what he spent four years in college for. His love is in the field of biology.
I asked him if he ever thought about teaching and pointed out to him that there are public schools everywhere and he could work where he wanted to live.He replied that he was considering doing just that. He'd had an excellent biology teacher in high school and, while he wasn't sure he could be as good a teacher as this person, he thought he'd like to try.
Those opting to go into the teaching profession have always had the choice of working where they want to live, but until fairly recently have not had the opportunity to get their education where they want to live in order to become a teacher. That changed a few years ago when White Mountains Community College began a partnership with Plymouth State University and Granite State College to bring the North Country Teacher Certification Program to northern New Hampshire.
This program, offered right on the WMCC campus, allows students to continue their education in the North Country after earning an Associate in Arts in Teacher Preparation from the White Mountains Community College. Our teacher preparation program at the WMCC gives students a solid base in liberal arts coupled with courses in human development, education and technology, allowing students to transfer to a four-year program to complete the second half of their course work and student teaching as they prepare for their career in education. Our two-year associate degree program also offers students a special education track which provides future teachers and paraprofessionals with the knowledge and skills for working with children with disabilities.
Students who intend to enter the four-year program for a baccalaureate degree from Plymouth State University need to earn at least a grade point average of 2.7 and pass the Praxis 1 exam. The Praxis 1 is a pre-professional test to measure basic skills in reading, writing, and mathematics.
The North Country Teacher Certification Program kicked off in 2005, with 15 WMCC students starting as college juniors and working towards their Bachelor of Science degrees in childhood studies. That cohort of students, all 15 of them, received their degrees from Plymouth State University in 2007. And the majority of them are now teaching and living right here in the North Country!
We are pleased to be working in such a collaborative way with the renowned teacher education program at Plymouth State University, sharing resources, faculty and programs. We are very pleased to be able to be a part of the North Country's future in this way, helping our students become the teachers who will inspire the region's primary and secondary school students.
For more information about the program, contact Deb Stewart, at WMCC at 752-1113, ext. 2151 or via e-mail at dstewart@ccsnh.edu, or contact Mary Ford at Granite State College at 228-3000, ext 370, mary.ford@granite.edu, or contact Irene Mosedale, representing PSU at 752-1113, ext. 1212 or e-mail her at mosedale@plymouth.edu.
Back to News List9/12/2008
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