The small district’s apprenticeship program lets aspiring teachers earn a bachelor’s degree and teacher certification at no cost. In return, participants must work at the district for at least three years. Observers hope state lawmakers will use the program as a model for legislation.
The Brazosport Independent School District is always in need of more teachers — and for a long time, it wasn’t able to find enough.
Located about 60 miles south of Houston, the 11,500-student district doesn’t have a big college of education nearby to churn out new teachers. It’s hard to compete with larger districts in the region for talent or convince educators to move to the small town of Clute, where Brazosport ISD is based. Over time, classroom sizes grew as vacancies stayed open.
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