Drake University launches teacher intern program for professional stu…

Drake University will offer people with a passion for teaching, who took a different path, a way to earn their teaching credentials and master’s degree while gaining in-classroom experience.

The new Teacher Intern Program, developed over the past year and approved by the Iowa State Board of Education in March, will put students with a bachelor’s degree in any field and at least three years of professional experience into a two-year program, the first focused on taking courses and the second on training in a real classroom setting.

Drake School of Education Dean Ryan Wise said the program was created to give people who may wish to become a teacher but who are already locked into a different job, or who have found barriers to entering a more traditional teaching education. It will launch in the fall, he said, and people have already started showing interest.

“This program removes those barriers and gives them an opportunity to come back and…