Grays Harbor College plans to offer a four-year teacher training program starting in fall 2017.

The program will be at GHC’s Aberdeen campus and will be a joint effort with Centralia College. Some of the courses will be offered to local students through a video connection from CC, which is in Lewis County

“So many people desperately want to be teachers, but they don’t have the time to continue their educations,” said JEB Thornton, assistant dean for Transfer and Baccalaureate Programs. “They just need that next boost of education to become full-fledged teachers.”

The program is designed for paraprofessionals already working in the field so they can work full time and take classes after work. Paraprofessionals have two-year degrees and some of them have been working in area classrooms for decades.

“School districts are having a really hard time getting new teachers,” Thornton said. “Often they’re hiring younger teachers from out of the area who teach for two years, then move on.”

Exacerbating the situation is that many experienced teachers are retiring.

“It’s the Silver Tsunami,” he explained. “And there aren’t a lot of folks to fill their places.”

GHC plans for up to 25 students to enter the new program this fall. There is a two-year program already at the college.

This new program comes with an early admissions process that begins in January 2017. This will allow students to take prerequisite courses in the spring and summer so they can fully concentrate on the high-level courses debuting next fall. Some of the students who obtained their paraprofessional educations years before might need to complete some updated coursework.

Tuition will be in line with other institutions and students will be offered the choice between two specialties for working with students in kindergarten through 8th grade.

After working with area education professionals to create this new program, Thornton said the result should be an educational endeavor that’s “robust, rigorous and affordable.”

Other colleges, such as Washington State University, offered similar teaching programs in the past. When the guest institutions had to cut their offerings because the economy slowed down they would leave, he said.

But with localized control “we’ll be able to expand and contract based on the needs of the community,” Thornton explained. “And we’ll be growing our own teachers.”

An informational session about the Bachelor of Applied Science – Teacher Education degree will be held Oct. 20 from 4 to 5:30 p.m. in Room 4135 of the Schermer Building on the Aberdeen campus.