I remember the first time I stood in front of a classroom as a new teacher. I had spent years studying education, reading theory, and completing coursework. Yet the moment I faced a room full of students, I realized how different the reality of teaching feels from the way we often prepare people to do it. Teaching is learned through practice, reflection, and relationships with students. Yet the pathway into the profession often delays meaningful exposure to that work until late in a candidate’s preparation. At the same time, thousands of high school students and paraprofessionals are already working with younger learners every day. They tutor, mentor, assist in classrooms, and help students navigate learning challenges. Our systems rarely treat those experiences as part of the pathway into the profession. If we want to strengthen and grow the educator workforce, we need to rethink when the education career pathway starts and how early preparation connects to becoming a successful teacher.
Building the front end of the profession
Educators Rising offers early preparation for students. Instead of waiting until college to explore the teaching profession, high school students can participate in Educators Rising’s structured pathway. Our students explore the profession, work with younger learners, develop instructional skills, and demonstrate competencies long before they formally enter teacher preparation programs. Educators Rising functions like the front end of a professional pathway. Students gain early exposure to the work of teaching, opportunities to practice with younger learners, and ways to demonstrate their skills through performance assessments and competitions. Just as important, they become part of a national community of aspiring educators.
These experiences help students develop both competence and identity as educators. Students who see themselves as educators earlier are far more likely to remain connected to the profession, whether they stay in classrooms or pursue other roles across the broader education ecosystem. Teaching remains the anchor of this pathway, but it is not the only way to contribute to the future of learning. Education today includes so many influential jobs, many of which people discover while pursuing other careers — curriculum design, edtech, assessment innovation, venture startup, architectural design pedagogy, and new forms of school leadership. Introducing students to this broader landscape can make education a more compelling field for young people who want to shape how learning works.
The path into teaching doesn’t have to be long and expensive
For many students, one of the greatest barriers to entering the profession is cost. Becoming a teacher typically requires four years of undergraduate study, followed by certification requirements that can extend the timeline even further. For students from low-income backgrounds, cost can make teaching financially unrealistic. The challenge is not simply tuition. It also is the lack of alignment between what students learn in high school, what teacher preparation programs require, and how early education experience is recognized along the way.
Other professions have built well-defined pipelines. Students interested in fields such as health care, engineering, or information technology often begin structured pathways in high school. Those pathways frequently include early coursework, technical credentials, and work-based learning that translate directly into postsecondary credit or advanced standing. Education has been slower to build those bridges. Strengthening the educator pipeline will require stronger articulation between high schools, school districts, and postsecondary institutions so that early preparation and experience garners credits and other tangible advantages.
When early preparation counts
One promising mechanism for connecting high school pathways to higher education is dual enrollment, which allows students to earn college credit while still in high school. Today, dual-enrollment programs exist in roughly 82% to 89% of American high schools. When done effectively, these programs allow students to graduate with meaningful college credit, sometimes even an associate degree. This can shorten the path to a bachelor’s degree by one or two years and significantly reduce the cost of higher education.
Access to these opportunities, however, remains uneven. High-poverty schools are significantly less likely to offer dual enrollment than more affluent schools, and participation rates remain relatively low nationwide. For this reason, there should be several alternatives to connecting high school pathways to postsecondary preparation. Colleges and universities might grant advanced standing for demonstrated competencies, translate micro credentials or performance-based badges into college credits, or offer preferred admissions for students who complete educator pathways.
These kinds of articulation agreements in the long run could support multiple postsecondary directions within the education field, from teacher preparation to instructional design, school leadership, or learning innovation. For many students, especially those from low-income backgrounds, reducing both the time and cost required to earn a degree can make the difference between pursuing teaching and considering another career.
Recognizing the educators already in our schools
Another important opportunity lies with paraprofessionals, who support instruction every day in our schools. Many work closely with students, assist with small-group instruction, and help teachers manage learning environments. They often build deep relationships with the communities they serve. For many of these individuals, becoming a teacher is a natural next step. Yet the pathway from paraprofessional to licensed educator often requires starting college from the beginning, despite years of classroom experience.
With stronger partnerships between school districts and higher education institutions, qualified paraprofessionals could receive advanced standing, competency-based credits, or access to accelerated degree pathways that acknowledge the instructional work they are already doing. Recognizing this experience would not only accelerate their path to licensure but also strengthen the “Grow Your Own” strategies that many districts pursue to build more diverse and community-rooted educator workforces.
Designing a seamless educator pathway
Several states and districts are beginning to connect high school educator pathways with postsecondary teacher preparation. Early college teacher academies, Grow Your Own initiatives, and similar models show what is possible when systems are intentionally aligned. To build on this progress, three shifts would make a meaningful difference.
First, states and institutions should strengthen articulation between educator pathways in high school and teacher preparation programs in colleges and universities. Second, states and districts should create accelerated pathways for paraprofessionals to allow their classroom experience to count toward licensure. Third, policy makers should modernize the Education and Training career cluster to reflect the full landscape of the learning field. Alongside preparing classroom teachers, pathways can introduce students to additional types of education careers.
For students who know they want to teach, the profession should feel within reach.
This article appears in the Summer 2026 issue of Kappan, Vol. 107, No. 7-8.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jeanie Lee
Jeanie Lee is the CEO of PDK International.
