CSUB hosts HBCUs for teacher residency training

California State University, Bakersfield's Black Educator Teacher Residency (BETR) program had the opportunity earlier this year to share best practices with six schools from North Carolina.

The institutions - all Historic Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) - visited in January for two days as part of the Residency Design Academy, a National Center for Teacher Residencies training program aimed at helping colleges develop their own residency programs.

The schools were able to learn about all of CSUB's residency programs, but the main focus was on the BETR program, which is a residency for grades TK-9 that is dedicated to recruiting educators with a focus on Afrocentric cultural competency.

"CSUB's award-winning, innovative and groundbreaking residency programs are being emulated across the country," said Dr. Bre Evans-Santiago, co-coordinator of BETR and chair of the Teacher Education Department. "We are proud of our nationally recognized programs and the impact they are having as we intentionally aim to recruit, prepare for and retain BIPOC educators. We appreciate the seven HBCU college guests and NCTR staff as they exhausted energy and time to travel all the way to California from North Carolina to learn more for their own teacher candidates. We are in this together and are strengthening teacher programs across the nation."

Visit the BETR website for more information about the program. To learn about other CSUB teacher residencies, visit the Teacher Education Department website.