The Teach Grant Program provides scholarship assistance in the amount of $4,000 per year to each qualified student who wants to get a degree in education and teach classes in “high need” areas.
In the CNMI, the high need areas are kindergarten to 12th grade, language arts for 7th-12th grades, and mathematics for 7th -12th grades.
PSS federal programs officer Tim Thornburgh said the new federal program is good news for the local school system which is “in dire need of assistance to sustain the increasing need for teachers every year.”
According to Thornburgh, 75 percent of PSS employees have bachelor’s degrees while the rest have obtained master’s degree.
He said the new program provides a student $4,000 per year for four years.
The recipient has to serve for four years as a teacher in a high need area at a low-income school.
He or she must also have a 3.25 GPA or score at the 75 percentile or above on a nationally normed standardized college admissions test.
Thornburgh said the recipient must maintain a cumulative 3.25 GPA for each payment period and must complete the four-year agreement to serve requirement within an eight-year period after graduation from college. Otherwise, he added, the grant converts to an unsubsidized student loan.
“The Teach Grant also provides $4,000 scholarships for a period of two years for current or retired teachers to attain a master’s degree,” he added. “The teacher must be highly qualified.”
PSS has over 500 classroom teachers.
