October 3, 2023 — Our Residency Design Academy (RDA) team hosted an in-person institute at the International Civil Rights Museum in Greensboro, N.C. NCTR’s SEED-funded HBCU cohort–made up of Bennett College, Livingstone College, North Carolina A&T State University, North Carolina Central University, Saint Augustine’s University, and Shaw University–were all able to begin work on their teacher residency design in a meaningful setting.
The RDA cohort heard from a panel of our members who lead teacher residency programs in NCTR’s Network–Dr. LaKeshia Opara-Nadi (Jackson State University Teacher Residency), Dr. Tommy Nalls Jr. (Jackson Public Schools, JPS Teacher Residency, Mississippi State Department of Education Teacher Residency) and Delana Reeves (Atlanta Public Schools and partner with CREATE Teacher Residency). They all shared insights from their experience about the value of partnerships and what it takes to lead a teacher residency program.
The HBCUs then got to work on their own foundational programmatic structures, writing mission and vision statements and starting to determine roles and responsibilities within the teacher residency partnerships they are designing.
To close the day, we were guided on a tour of the museum which sits on the site of Woolworth’s lunch counter sit-in movement that contributed to our nation’s racial desegregation movement in the 1960s. To add poignancy to the moment, this movement that began on Feb. 1, 1960 was started and planned by students from two of the same universities in our cohort: NC A&T and Bennett College. This connection to the legacy of advancing civil and human rights infused renewed energy, meaning, and purpose to the work that the HBCUs had accomplished that day. The last words from our final reflection were from the leaders at NC A&T, who encouraged everyone to do what it takes to keep the teacher residency work moving forward–it was too important not to.
We offer that same encouragement to all of our teacher residency programs. May the spark ignited here be transferable to you and your work as well!