College Hosting Beginning Teacher Institute July 11-13; Applications Being Accepted

RALEIGH, North Carolina — Teachers in the first three years of their career can receive free professional development from experienced and award-winning educators to help them prepare for the new school year at the Beginning Teacher Institute. Hosted by the NC State College of Education, the institute will be held July 11-13 in Poe Hall on NC State’s main campus.

Open to both elementary and secondary teachers, sessions are designed to be relevant and practical and cover everything from getting ready for Day One and Week One to classroom management to exciting ideas for curriculum. Facilitators will include the North Carolina Teacher of the Year and current and past district teachers of the year. Detailed information about sessions will be available soon on Sched.org.

Teachers can apply online through July 1. NC State alumni have priority acceptance until June 1.

Kerri Brown Parker, the managing director of the Beginning Teacher Institute, shares below why the college started the Beginning Teacher Institute and what teachers can get out of it. Contact her with questions.

Beyond the Diploma: Supporting Beginning Teachers after Graduation

Beginning teachers graduate from colleges of education with solid theory, useful practicum experiences, a wealth of resources and a great enthusiasm for what they are about to tackle. Likely

they have spent weeks, months, maybe years thinking about how their “very own classroom” will function. Then the first day comes and each new teacher has ownership of her classroom. The students arrive and they have their own ideas about how the class will go and what each day will be like; rarely does the dream classroom come to fruition. Even with extensive teacher preparation and a great toolbox to start out teaching well, beginning teachers need ongoing support to be fully successful in the classroom.

School districts often provide mentoring and workshops for new teachers. To support this effort and the needs of our alumni beginning teachers, the NC State College of Education offers our alumni and new teachers around the state opportunities to participate in a Beginning Teacher Institute (BTI). Teachers in their first three years of the profession can participate in a three-day intensive summer institute. Sessions at the BTI include practical, hands-on experiences for the participants so they can put ideas into action immediately at school. Our session facilitators are primarily successful, practicing teachers from a variety of levels and subject areas including the NC Teacher of the Year. Our purpose in using practicing teachers is to be sure our content is as relevant and practical as possible. We provide stipends for our teacher facilitators, catered meals for our participants and more.

Session topics are determined by requests from beginning teachers and by the organizing committee. The sessions are grade level dependent so that elementary teachers get instruction and advice from elementary teachers and secondary teachers can work with their peers. Topics range from using data practically to enhance instruction to classroom management techniques to early career teacher success stories. Our second and third year teachers also have chances to demonstrate leadership by sharing mini-sessions on what has been successful in their own classrooms. — Kerri Brown Parker, managing director of Beginning Teacher Institute

What Others Are Saying

“I applied to the Beginning Teacher Institute because I thought it would be a great opportunity to gather a variety of resources, listen to other teachers who have been through situations I could possibly encounter, and learn how to be a great and effective classroom teacher.” — Delsa Castaneda

 

“The sessions reminded me that we are all going through very similar experiences as beginning teachers. It was encouraging to share our frustrations and success stories in such a supportive environment. I appreciated the sessions that focused on classroom management strategies and data collection tips.” — Harrison Do