August 5, 2025 — The federal landscape on education has continued to significantly shift. Despite this shift, teacher residency programs and teacher registered apprenticeship programs (T-RAPs) continue to be effective models to prepare the next generation of teachers while adapting to new funding ecosystems. The two pathways work toward the same mission and share many similarities. We examined these pathways in a report, titled “Teacher Residencies as the Foundation for Teacher Registered Apprenticeship Programs,” which articulates how the teacher residency model and T-RAPs can complement each other to offer teacher preparation pathways that center quality, workforce-driven teacher preparation.
The report highlights two members of NCTR’s Network, the Baltimore Teacher Apprenticeship Program (BTAP) and the University of Southern Mississippi Golden Eagle Teacher Apprenticeship (USM), to outline helpful learnings from the teacher residency movement for programs interested in becoming a T-RAP and current challenges related to becoming and operating T-RAPs.
For over 20 years, teacher residency programs have advocated for reducing barriers to entry into the teaching profession, ensured a stronger connection between preparation and actual classroom experiences, and prepared teacher candidates to teach in the communities they are prepared in. NCTR has codified characteristics and practices of effective teacher residency programs into the Levers for Teacher Residencies. The levers align directly with the core components of registered apprenticeship programs:
Created in a bipartisan manner, these pathways toward becoming an educator programs continue to result in highly qualified teachers which in turn result in better prepared students, an outcome all can unify behind.
We hope you will save the date for October 9, 2025, at 1 p.m. CT for a NCTR webinar highlighting the findings of this report and uplifting the work of our teacher residency programs. Keep reading NCTR Impact for more details!
Sincerely,
Eduardo Lara, Ph.D., Director of Programs, NCTR
Krystian Palmero, Director of Programs, NCTR