ALAMANCE COUNTY, N.C. — Teachers are retiring or quitting and many students are steering away from the teaching profession altogether.
But a program in Alamance County is picking up the shortfall of teachers.
Jodi Hofberg the teacher coordinator for Alamance Burlington Schools came up with the new student-to-teacher pipeline their hope will help with the shortage.
“We've had at one point over 100 openings,” Hofberg said. “We’ve had an issue with just finding people that are qualified that have an interest and passion for being in the classroom.”
Lillian Mcguire is a senior in Alamance Burlington Schools.
She said she's seen how the teacher shortage negatively impacts morale in the classroom.
“I've seen teachers care less and students care less and less," Mcguire said. "Grades dropping and the decline in mental health.”
Mcguire wants to build up her community and that's why she and six other ABSS students took a chance on the district's new Teacher Cadet program.
They meet twice a week to learn what it's like to build lesson plans and teaching styles, then every Friday they get real-life teaching experience at Andrews Elementary.
“It helped me out a lot more,” said Breckin Cluff a senior in the teacher cadet program. “I was looking at elementary for a while after dealing with both I realized I wanted to deal with high school children more.."
Cluff wants to become a high school history teacher.
Since he's part of the partnership between the school district and Alamance Community College, he can get his associate's degree at little to no cost. He'll then go on to a university and be guaranteed employment within ABSS upon graduation.
“I want to inspire them to be who they want to be," Cluff said. "I struggled a lot with mental health in middle and high school I can vividly remember every detail of those teachers that helped me through those times."
Finding those with Cluff's passion isn't easy.
Over a recent 10-year span, there's been a 35% drop in enrollment in colleges of education across our state.
ABSS hopes turning the page to this new solution will also turn more students into educators.
Eleven new students are already enrolled in next year's teacher cadet program.