Rural teaching corps offer models for a national program to bring youth back home as teachers

Rural schools are hoping to recruit local students to return home after college to releive teacher shortages. "Unable to compete with the higher salaries and greater social opportunities found in big cities and suburban districts, a growing number of rural school systems are turning to familiar faces to teach their students," Alan Scher Zagier of The Associated Press reports. "They know teachers with rural backgrounds are more likely to stick around and not leave after a year or two. They can be pretty sure that the absence of late-night clubs or art-house movie theaters won't drive away otherwise idealistic young teachers."

Suzanne Feldman, a senior at Drury University in Springfield, Mo., is a member of the inaugural class of the Ozarks Teachers Corps, which provides $4,000 annual scholarships in exchange for a commitment to work three years in a rural school district after graduation. "The community's expectations are higher" in rural areas, Feldman told Zagier. "Everybody knows everybody — and expects a whole lot more." Rural areas are far from a mystery to Feldman, who grew up in a town of fewer than 3,000.

"Small, rural communities are grounded in tradition and have deep roots," Catherine Kearney, president of the California Teacher Corps, told Zagier. "Someone who understands those traditions makes a huge difference." The California Corps, which hopes to attract professionals without teaching experience to classrooms, shifted its focus last year to the state's rural districts, which educate around 300,000 students. Randy Shaver, superintendent in Tupelo, Miss., says rural schools need a nationwide teaching corps to build on the efforts of programs like those in the Ozarks and California. "We need something that's far more intensive and far broader," Shaver said. (Read more)