College Graduates and Professionals

Are you interested in changing careers and are thinking about teaching?

If you’ve thought about trading your current job for a career that’s rich with challenges and personal rewards, consider becoming a teacher.

North Carolina's public school teachers have traditionally come from formal educator preparation programs. However, today’s demand for teachers far exceeds the supply of new graduates from these programs. "Alternate" routes to teaching were established by the North Carolina State Board of Education to help alleviate this shortage. These "non-traditional" routes to teaching were established for qualified individuals with college degrees outside the field of education.

Here’s some information that might be of interest to you.

You may become licensed to teach even if you did not complete a teacher education degree program. If you hold a bachelor’s degree from a regionally accredited institution and graduated with a cumulative GPA of at least 2.7 on a 4.0 scale, you may qualify for acceptance into an alternative licensure program.

Several alternative licensure programs exist. If you wish to complete your coursework before you begin teaching, you may pursue a licensure-only program of a Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) with a relevant degree. (See the Graduate School Office website for additional information.) The Master of Arts in Teaching (M.A.T.) is an interdisciplinary degree option within the Teacher Education degree program. The M.A.T. is intended for graduates from accredited colleges or universities with an undergraduate major in humanities, sciences, or social sciences that have few, if any, formal courses in education. The program is available only to those individuals who have not earned a clear license and who are seeking licensure in the teaching field in which they wish to earn the degree.

If you wish to teach while you complete your coursework, you may pursue the residency pathway.  The residency license is a one-year pathway, renewable up to two times (for a total of three years).  It is for candidates that meet the content requirements of licensure but may still need pedagogy requirements.  Click the link below for additional information.

Residency Licensure