Loyola Marymount University has been named the preferred California partner for Teach For America, now serving the San Francisco Bay Area in addition to the Los Angeles region.
Teach For America corps members in the San Francisco Bay Area will join the LMU|TFA Partnership to receive instruction and support from School of Education faculty and staff on-site in San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland. “Partnering with LMU has proven integral to Teach For America’s efforts to prepare and support our corps members as they work to change educational outcomes for students in Los Angeles public schools,” said Wendy Kopp, founder and CEO of Teach For America. “This is an excellent opportunity for the School of Education to expand our highly effective partnership with Teach For America to the San Francisco Bay Area and continue our commitment to educating leaders who serve under-resourced urban populations,” said Shane P. Martin, dean and professor for the School of Education. Ten years ago, LMU’s School of Education became Teach For America’s preferred university partner in the Los Angeles region providing graduate training and support for TFA corps members (LMU/TFA partnership program). The LMU/TFA partnership program is now one of the organization’s largest and most successful partnerships in the country. LMU School of Education administrators and faculty are excited about the expansion. “We look forward to working with TFA program leaders in Northern California,” said Edmundo Litton, program director for LMU/TFA and chair of the Specialized Programs in Urban Education Department. “This is a true partnership that has contributed to high rates of satisfaction and retention in the Los Angeles region. We will be working to extend the success of that partnership to other regions of the state.” Ninety percent of LMU/TFA interns stay in their assigned schools beyond the two-year commitment, far better than the national average of fewer than half according to a recent Harvard study. In the LMU/TFA partnership, interns get more intensive support that increases the likelihood of early success and foster a desire among these interns to remain difference-makers in their schools, according to Litton. A recent study by The Urban Institute’s CALDER research center found that in urban high schools, the impact of TFA corps members on student achievement was more than twice that of having a non-TFA teacher with three or more years of experience. |