The College of Education and Health Professions recently recognized the Arkansas Teacher Corps with the 2025 Service to Arkansas Award.

The Arkansas Teacher Corps is an outreach unit of the college and exists as a partnership between the U of A, the Arkansas Department of Education and Arkansas public school districts to recruit, train, license and support Arkansans as empowered teachers facilitating excellent, equitable education every day.

Dean Kate Mamiseishvili created the award as part of the WE CARE strategic plan to acknowledge "a faculty or staff member, team, or entire unit that has demonstrated extraordinary care for Arkansas and Arkansans through their research, outreach, and/or educational activities."

"The Arkansas Teacher Corps continues to make a meaningful impact on education in Arkansas," Mamiseishvili said. "I'm proud to recognize them with this award for all their hard work improving communities and schools throughout the state."

ATC staff members, led by Executive Director Brandon Lucius, were in attendance at the college's end-of-year meeting on May 2 to accept the award.

Since the program's inception in 2013, the Arkansas Teacher Corps has recruited, trained and supported 12 cohorts of more than 310 teachers in 99 schools and 42 school districts throughout central, eastern and southern Arkansas. The program has continued to grow, more than doubling the total number of ATC fellows supported each year between 2021 and 2024.

"ATC has had a huge impact across Arkansas," Lucius said. "Thanks to ATC, there are adults realizing their life-long dreams of being educators, schools making progress on solving teacher shortages, students achieving transformational academic and personal growth, and communities flourishing with newly empowered leaders, advocates, and change-makers."

Several of those who have been personally and professionally impacted by the Arkansas Teacher Corps shared what the organization means to them through nomination letters.

"Arkansas Teacher Corps exemplifies what it means to serve with purpose," said Monica McMurray, executive director of recruitment and talent acquisition for the Pine Bluff School District.

Stacey McAdoo, executive director of Teach Plus Arkansas, shared that she had "witnessed firsthand ATC's unwavering dedication to recruiting and retaining diverse educators."

"ATC exemplifies every trait in a strong education preparation program: it seeks to lower barriers to becoming an educator, empowers teachers with critical skills and knowledge, and provides meaningful support to blossom transformative careers in the classroom," said Henry Whitehead, program manager of Rural Schools Collective.

The Arkansas Teacher Corps fellows complete an initial six-week summer institute followed by over 40 hours of professional development and 40 hours of individualized classroom coaching each year during the three-year fellowship. Fellows attend an annual summer institute, where they attend sessions on instructional planning, classroom culture and professionalism while working with an ATC summer mentor to practice creating and delivering lessons.

The Service to Arkansas Award was first presented in 2024 to Early Care and Education Projects, an outreach unit in the college that delivers professional development to early childhood educators across Arkansas.

To read more about the work and mission of the Arkansas Teacher Corps, visit their website.