AURORA | DeVonte Loyd stood in front of a science classroom of middle schoolers last week, asking them to consider what changes they might make to a hypothetical cart to make it move left or right.
He asks the Sky Vista Middle School students if adding weight to one side of the cart or the other might make it turn.
Across the room is his mentor teacher, Alyssa Baker. She’s asking similar but different questions from the students on her side of the room.
Loyd commands the attention and excitement of the students in front of him just as well as Baker does on the other side, even though he is still a student himself, learning to be a teacher. The students learn that, yes, applying weight on one side of a cart creates torque on the wheel, making it turn in that direction.
Baker is mentoring Loyd as he actively works on his baccalaureate college courses at the Community College of Aurora, and although she is the teacher of the science class, they share a lot of the work.
More than a traditional student-teacher arrangement, Cherry Creek Schools launched a new program this year called the Aspiring Educator Pathway, where teaching students enrolled at the Community College of Aurora are mentored by experienced teachers in Cherry Creek classrooms. The CCA students co-teach in local classrooms for their entire college tenure, graduating with degrees and four years of classroom experience.
The program offers college students a lower tuition rate and makes them PERA-eligible Cherry Creek School District employees. The school district then pays them a $40,000 annual salary while they apprentice. Although this first group of college students in the new program had their tuition costs covered by a state college recruitment program, CCA students enrolled in the Pathway project can still see a net financial gain each year, making more in apprenticeship salary than they spend on tuition, Cherry Creek officials say.
Cherry Creek schools has invested about $760,000 in the program for the first year, making room for 16 participants. In return, the district gets a field of dedicated teachers who can join Cherry Creek schools upon graduation, already tenured. Classroom time among these apprentices is more than 4,000 hours, compared to the average 750 hours of classroom experience the would get as student teachers.
After four years in the program, participants leave the program with Colorado state teacher licenses issued by the school district, and their bachelor’s degree issued by CCA.
Rather than just creating typical student-teacher positions, the concept creates a co-teaching environment where both mentors and apprentices grow professionally while delivering more personalized instruction to students. School officials say the concept is based on medical residency programs.
Cherry Creek Chief Human Resources Officer Brenda Smith says the program uses “spiral effect.” The concept shows that knowledge in a subject deepens further by revisiting and focusing on issues over time, enhancing understanding and retention.
“This program is really going to change the lives of teachers and the way that they learn,” said another apprentice, Alison Duarte. “And I’m so excited to be a part of that.”
Last week, multiple participants spoke during a roundtable at Sky Vista Middle School and said they appreciated the program’s collaborative approach and how it differs from traditional teacher training methods. All of the participants said that the program, which launched this year, was a success.
“I was lucky enough to have Jordan placed with me,” said another mentor, Sam Turner, about his apprentice Jordan Cox. “I was Jordan’s eighth-grade teacher.”
Turner said he’s learned more from Jordan this year than Jordan has learned from him.
“It’s been an amazing experience,” Turner said.
Duarte said that she likes that she can take what she learned in class and apply it directly to the students. She said she was excited to go to the students and say, “I know why you’re struggling with that, and I know how to help.”
She appreciated that she could immediately bring what she learned into the classroom.
Colorado Department of Education Commissioner Susan Cordova said she thinks the program could be a potential solution to teacher recruitment and retention challenges across the state.
“One of our goals is to try to really support the recruitment and protection of great teachers, and this is such a great example of how we can rethink what it looks like to join the teaching profession,” Cordova said.
The program could be growing half to two-thirds of the teachers the school district needs, and the teachers would already have four years of experience on their first day as a teacher, which is “incredibly inspiring,” Cordova said.
“I’m excited for next year, because I feel like we’ve got a good foundation, and Alison has changed everything about my perspective on teaching,” said Duarte’s mentor Jessica Daubert.
She said it also allows her to take a sick day without being concerned or stressed.
“I don’t have that guilt, I don’t have that pressure,” Daubert said. and she no longer has to spend hours creating lesson plans for a substitute teacher she said go awry more often than not.
All of the teachers at the roundtable said they appreciated and wanted to continue pursuing the support and community that the mentor-program created. Apprentices learn from each other, and veteran teachers learn as well.
Daubert told the group that she was somewhat skeptical at first about having an apprentice. Not anymore. She drew laughs from the group, insisting that she is taking Duarte with her next year, no questions asked.
For Duarte, the first year in the program made her love to be a teacher even as she’s still learning how.
“This is why I’m doing this. I’m gonna have hard days, but I’m also going to have great days,” Duarte said. “They are learning every single day, and they love it. They love it.”
Cherry Creek plans to continue the program while expanding.
Being a great teacher doesn’t guarantee they’ll be great mentors, school officials said. One goal is to better predict which teachers are best for the program and even a best fit for each apprentice.
School administrators, however, dubbed the program a success so far.
“You were first. You were the foundation of this program,” Superintendent Christopher Smith said to the roundtable. “It is your responsibility to set the tone for the next group of people who come through.”