Duke sets out on teacher mission

Durham schools are target of initiatives

Duke University is launching three initiatives this fall that will offer intensive Spanish-language training to Durham teachers, provide mentoring for veteran teachers to reduce turnover and allow students to earn free master's degrees in teaching if they'll teach in Durham Public Schools.

With a $925,000 price tag, the programs are the latest in a partnership between the university and the school system.

"It's always been a priority that Duke be engaged with the public schools in an effort to strengthen them," said John F. Burness, Duke's senior vice president for public affairs. "We have a really large number of people who live in Durham; therefore, the quality of education is very important because it affects our employees."

Duke established the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership in 1996 to improve the 12 neighborhoods closest to campus and to boost student achievement in the seven public schools in those neighborhoods. The relationship has helped finance health clinics in schools, sent Spanish-speaking tutors to several schools and created a mentoring program for first-year teachers.

"Duke has always been there for us," Superintendent Ann Denlinger said. "This will simply enhance the work we're already doing in the schools."

This latest venture resulted from conversations between Duke President Richard Brodhead and school officials when he toured several schools shortly after he came to the university last year. Teachers, administrators and parents told Brodhead some of their needs, Burness said, and he worked to find a way to address them.

Finding qualified teachers is a perennial issue, so Brodhead wanted to come up with an incentive for some of the brightest teachers to work in Durham.

That desire produced the new Durham Teaching Fellows program, which over the next three years will provide full tuition and a stipend to 24 people who enter the university's master's of arts in teaching program. In exchange for Duke shelling out at least $43,000 a year for the two-year degree for each participant, the teachers must spend two years in Durham Public Schools.

The second initiative responds to a growing issue in Durham schools -- the influx of Spanish-speaking families.

Ten years ago, one in 50 students in Durham public schools was Hispanic. Today, it's one in six. At some schools, including several in the Duke-Durham partnership neighborhoods, the number is much higher. More than 40 percent of the students at Lakewood Elementary are Hispanic.

But like districts across the state, Durham has struggled to find staff and teachers fluent in Spanish.

That has made it difficult for schools to provide the same level of service to Spanish-speaking children and their families as they do to others, said Cheryl Fuller, principal at E.K. Powe, a partnership elementary school. A quarter of Powe's students are Latino.

"Right now, it is one of our biggest challenges," Fuller said. "Ultimately, it does create such a barrier to that warm, welcome feeling. It is important to be able to naturally speak with someone."

Starting this fall and for the next three years, Duke will teach Spanish to 30 staff members a year from Powe, Lakewood, George Watts and Forest View elementary schools. Those staff members will get training before and throughout the school year and will be able to travel to Mexico during the summer for a weeklong immersion.

The final initiative seeks to improve the district's teacher retention rate. About 42 percent of new teachers leave Durham by their third year. An initiative started last year that is partially financed by Duke seeks to keep more new teachers from leaving. This one is intended to keep veteran teachers, those with three to seven years of experience under their belts.

Thirty teachers will be selected each year for three years to participate in a two-day professional growth workshop and then continue their development through follow-up sessions for the remainder of the year.

"Everyone seems gung-ho," said David Stein, who works with the partnership for Duke. "It is just one of those no-brainers where we have the capability [to provide the service], and we have such strong interest from the schools."

Duke is bankrolling the new programs, but the school system will decide who attends the program.

"In the long run, we hope we will change the overall education and reputation of the school system," Burness said.

Burness said he sees Duke's work with the schools as leading by example. If other businesses see Duke's commitment to the public schools, perhaps they, too, will pitch in, he said.