K-12 Teachers Are Disproportionately White and Monolingual. Here’s One Way That Could Change.

This year, Yazmin Gil is a teacher mentor in her district’s two-year Bilingual Teacher Fellows Program, a partnership between Highline Public Schools and Woodring College of Education at Western Washington University that prepares paraprofessionals to earn their teacher certification. The 17 fellows will earn a bachelor’s degree and K-8 teaching credentials in a program structured to reduce financial, academic, and bureaucratic barriers to success. A mentor teacher gives them ongoing feedback on lesson plans and instruction. Each fellow has a WWU field mentor to help them with problem-solving, and WWU administrative staff are on hand to help fellows navigate the university admission process.