Among the nearly 800 students who graduated this fall from Middle Georgia State University (MGA) are about 40 members of the charter class of the IGNITE Teacher Residency Program, a grow-your-own classroom teachers initiative of the DeKalb County School District. 

Launched about a year ago, the school district chose to partner with MGA’s School of Education & Behavioral Sciences, which offers an online Master of Arts in Teaching program. The school district selected students who hold non-education bachelor’s degrees to move through MGA’s master’s program together as a cohort. DeKalb covered tuition and provided each student with a living stipend. In exchange, the graduates commit to teaching in the DeKalb County School District for at least five years. 

“We chose Middle Georgia State University because when we put out our request for proposals, we wanted to make sure that we had a university that aligned with our mission and vision,” said Kendrick Johnson, a consultant with the IGNITE program. “MGA was flexible and able to provide the necessary skills and strategies that we know that our prospective teachers are going to need. We’re super excited about the partnership.” 

One of the graduates, Felicia Freeman, currently teaches at Columbia High School and will begin at Cedar Grove Middle School in January. 

At first, “the program was a lot for me, because I had been out of school for 20 plus years,” she said. “So getting reacclimated with doing papers and getting reacclimated with checking in and doing the work was a lot, but I did it. (MGA) worked with IGNITE and made sure that we got everything that we needed.” 

Dr. David Biek, dean of the School of Education & Behavioral Sciences, said MGA and the DeKalb County School District has a shared goal of addressing the teacher shortage. “By leveraging federal, state and local funding, amazing opportunities can be realized,” he said. “With this commencement, we celebrate several dozen new teachers, including in the high-needs areas of mathematics and science.”