College Knowledge, Access, and Readiness

Students can earn from 3 - 12 credits that can transfer to teacher education programs. One of the hallmarks of Pathways2Teaching's success is that high school students have regular interactions with and are mentored by our team of current college students. Schools that adopt our program are assigned one of our school support team members who meets virtually with the class several times a month. They work directly with the class instructor to see how best they can support the instructor and students. Most of our school support team are college students who are graduates of the Pathways2Teaching program.

Weekly field experience in a local elementary school is an essential part of the curriculum to build workforce readiness and prepare them for their roles as paraprofessionals and future teachers.

College & Workforce readiness skills are integrated throughout all courses with an emphasis on developing academic writing skills. Each course has a set of required essays and writing prompts that are part of scope and sequence. As part of the Introduction to Socially Just Education course, students participate in an in-depth research project, similar in scope to Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR). Each student picks a topic of interest to them and investigates it on many levels including reading the relevant literature, learning about experts on this topic, including scholars of color, and finally, students must write a research paper detailing their literature review, what data they collected as part of their research, how they analyzed their data, and what recommendations they have for changes.

We believe in casting a wide net by making sure all students can enroll in the Pathways2Teaching program. There is NO GPA requirement to enroll. We seek to expand access & opportunities for success by supporting students' success with a rigorous and culturally relevant program so students can earn a ParaProfessional Certificate

Each step of the way students are provided with resources created by Dr. Bianco and support from their instructor and our team.

Brief video about Pathways2Teaching

Listen to student discuss importance of No GPA requirement

Field Experience - Teaching Reading Comprehension Skills

Students are taught to teach basic reading comprehension skills for elementary K-3. They are provided with a handbook of skills to teach and this is reinforced during class time. Strong collaboration between the Pathways2Teaching instructor and the elementary teacher is crucial to success of the partnership. We encourage multilingualism and support our students in using their heritage language for instruction when appropriate.

Interestingly, hundreds of student interviews confirm that this element of the Pathways2Teaching program appears to have the greatest positive impact on our male students.