A priority for the College of Education at Southern Connecticut State University is to attend to the needs of CT local schools in the preparation of educators (teachers, school leaders and support staff). The strategic plan of the College of Education 2015-2020 outlines several objectives to build collaborative synergies with school districts, learning centers and state agencies. The School is committed to addressing the need to recruit and retain minority students and to provide excellent initial and advanced preparation routes into a wide variety of school professions.
In 2016, the College of Education launched the Minority Educator Initiative to develop concrete, actionable plans and goals to address these needs. Such an initiative will be in part funded by scholarships arising from generous donations to the College of Education and a recent $2.2m bequest.
The committee consists of faculty, staff and administrators from SCCU, and superintendents of schools. The major goal of the committee was to strengthen efforts to increase the pool of teachers in areas for which it is hard to find teachers and to increase the pool of qualified minority candidates for teaching positions in general.
The results of the minority teachers’ recruitment initiate will be measured over time by comparing the gender and ethnicity data for program completers and the new teachers that are recommended for teacher certification.