New Program Prepares Future Teachers With Hands-On Classroom Experience

Aurora, Colo. – The Community College of Aurora (CCA) and the Cherry Creek School District (CCSD) are partnering for a new transformative program designed to offer hands-on experience to future teachers, and prepare them for the classroom. 

CCSD’s Aspiring Educator Pathway Program will offer in-class learning with a collaborative team-teaching style. Instructors will provide guided mentorship, giving students an innovative approach to learning and instruction. 

The program adopts a similar model to CCSD’s Medical Residency program that offers more than 4,000 hours of classroom experience, compared to the typical 700 hours. Doing so, officials say, will better prepare future teachers for student needs now and in the years to come. 

CCA President, Dr. Mordecai Brownlee praised the program, saying, “This innovative initiative represents our shared commitment to shaping the future of education by providing future educators with a transformative pathway to becoming exceptional teachers. By combining hands-on classroom experience with guidance from high-performing mentors, we are creating a unique opportunity for aspiring educators to thrive and make a lasting impact on the communities they will serve.”

As part of the partnership with CCA, students in the program will benefit from a lower tuition rate as they work toward their degree, and become PERA-eligible CCSD employees. The program launches its first cohort of 16 teacher apprentices across six schools in the 2024-2025 academic year. 

Dr. Bobby Pace, CCA’s Vice President of Academic Success said, “This partnership reflects a true commitment to ensuring the social and economic mobility of our rising educators while also providing a pipeline of amazing talent. The mission alignment of our two institutions will ensure livable wages while pursuing their degrees, a high-quality education, and exceptional work-based experience to hone the skills of the next generation of educational practitioners.”

With a focused and immersive approach, educators say they hope to reimagine the teacher learning environment and set a high standard for excellence in education. In 2023, the Colorado State Legislature passed SB23-87 authorizing the Colorado Department of Education (CDE) to develop a Teacher Degree Apprenticeship Program which offers an alternative route to teacher licensure by creating a teacher degree apprenticeship program. It requires many of the same elements of current teacher licensure programs such as obtaining a bachelor’s degree, training programs approved by the CDE and structured on-the-job training. The bill allows CDE to issue a Teacher Apprenticeship Authorization to an apprentice who is employed by a school district or other type of school who is actively registered in an apprenticeship program and actively enrolled in an affiliated bachelor’s degree program from an accredited higher education institution. In this case, the accreditation for the program comes from CCA while licensure for teachers would come from CCSD.