NCSU steps up for rural schools, teachers

N.C. State University answers the call of public service with vigor. And Celeste Castillo, a junior student in the College of Education at NCSU, is a good example of a future grad following the call. Students in her classroom in the small community where she’ll be hired to teach one day will be lucky indeed.

Just consider what she says about the TIP Teaching Scholars Award Program that is a partner with N.C. State and a nonprofit led by 24 North Carolina superintendents in rural school districts. The program aims to award teachers $10,000 over two yearsand provide extra coaching as 10 students from the class of 2019 go to one of five rural counties to teach.

Says Castillo, who’ll be among them: “It’s not about the money, and the problems are the incentive to go and make a difference. I just never really saw myself in a rural area, but if I had the support system there, especially for the beginning, that would be cool.”

We’ll take all the NCSU teachers who share Castillo’s vision, who want, like so many idealistic young people, to make a difference. This program is a grand example of how a public university does something, really does something, to help people in the state, and areas of the state, that need that help.

This story was originally published October 10, 2017 at 10:39 AM with the headline "NCSU steps up for rural schools, teachers."