Yearlong Classroom Apprenticeship
The residency begins with an intensive two-month summer institute, designed to give you the initial skills and knowledge you need to serve as part of a teacher team on day one of the residency school year. You then spend the entire academic year in a BPE Teaching Academy, learning to teach in a collaborative mentoring environment. You are assigned to an academic department and grade level team and work under the close guidance of experienced educators, four full days per week (Monday-Thursday). Residents devote one evening and all day Friday to BTR’s rigorous graduate coursework. This combination helps you link classroom experience to relevant theory and research, learn and rehearse new instructional practices, and ground your own learning in your students’ learning and school context.
Collaborative Learning Environment
Over the course of the year, you’ll assume increasing responsibility in the classroom: working with individual students, in small groups, and in whole class settings. The resident is an important part of a teacher team; these teams make instructional decisions based on the learning needs of students and the standards-based curricular goals and objectives. Teacher teams are supported by Directors of Instruction in each content area, who help guide instructional decisions for students and adult learning opportunities. By situating residents as a part of a teaching team, the program is designed to ensure both increased learning for students and excellent preparation for you, the resident.
Rigorous, Aligned Coursework
The program’s unique blend of theory and practice, combined with an emphasis on collaborative learning and peer support, gives you a field-tested foundation for success in an urban classroom. By the time you graduate from BTR and become a teacher of record in a BPS classroom, you already have a year of experience, an understanding of the challenges that lie ahead, and an ever-expanding support network of fellow educators.
