Flanders New Teacher Award Benefits Urban Instructors

A new program funded by Flanders Fellowship benefactor Mary Jane Brinton will help teachers with their first year in the public schools. The New Teacher Award Program provides $2,000 grants to GSE graduates who elect to teach in urban schools that are short on resources. The program recognizes the crucial importance of the first year of teaching in helping to retain credential program graduates, and the shortage of supplies and materials that often frustrates faculty in public schools.

The program is specifically designed to encourage Flanders Fellow credential graduates to continue their dedication to educating students in low-performing schools. At least twenty students who finished their credentials this year have already begun receiving the funds for their new classrooms.

Award recipients must spend the year working in a needy urban school, agree to report on use of the award gift, and be willing to participate in a GSE focus group to discuss the impact of these funds on their classroom and students. Applications are open to Flanders Fellows in UC Berkeley teaching credential programs.