Your student teaching story is needed to advocate for a more accessible path to becoming an educator.
Too many student teachers are required to do the work of a full-time educator without pay. This reality creates financial stress and pushes too many future teachers away from the profession.
Unpaid student teaching programs have been the norm for too long, but that doesn’t mean they have to be our future. We can create new, accessible paths to becoming an educator. Paying student teachers promotes racial and social justice and helps retain and recruit talented educators. Plus, we simply deserve compensation for our work!
Members of the National Education Association are working to end unjust unpaid student teaching. We are putting together a collection of stories from Aspiring Educators across the country. This will be a powerful tool as we work with NEA leaders to develop policy proposals and for us to share with legislators as a way for them to hear from the next generation of educators.
Tips for developing a powerful advocacy story:
- Introduce yourself: Educators, and future educators, are some of the most trusted voices in our country. Explain your experience with the issue and why this is important to you.
- Be personal: Never underestimate the power of emotions! Use specific moments and feelings to frame the facts to create a narrative that will move people to agree with you and act.
- Define the problem: Once you have shared your individual experience, zoom out to explain how this affects the public education system or our communities as a whole. Focus on the impact that this issue has on policymakers’ constituents.
- Offer solutions: You don’t need to be a policy expert yourself, but it is important to let leaders know you are thinking beyond the problem and that you want to work with them to find a solution. In this case, it can be as broad as a call for all student teaching to be paid.
Please set aside between 15-20 minutes to fill out this form. Taking the time to craft your story will make the difference when we share these testimonies with leaders!