Share the Spirit: Bay Area nonprofit develops teachers amid Bay Area educator shortage

"Nargiz Mammadli and Emmanuel "Manny" Morando Neri both have a passion for teaching, and in particular, teaching young learners. Early Childhood Education Substitute Teacher Empowerment & Placement (ECE STEP) is looking to provide connections and training to help them pursue both. With an eye toward careers in education, both Mammadli and Morando Neri said they have gotten a boost from resources provided by the nonprofit commonly known as ECE STEP."

""We want to train, manage, empower and place teachers in early childhood programs," said Sabrina Dong, an official with ECE STEP. "The whole concept is to address the shortage of teachers in the Bay Area. We bring in people with minimum experience as a teacher, and we support them all the way through the process. I am proud of the program. We are seeing a lot of success.""

Nargiz Mammadli and Emmanuel 'Manny' Morando Neri aspire to careers teaching young learners and have received support from ECE STEP. Mammadli became inspired to teach at age eight after meeting a kind teacher. Morando Neri focuses on early childhood social-emotional learning and helping children regulate emotions. ECE STEP launched a substitute teacher program in 2018 to build skills and create pathways to permanent positions. The nonprofit trains, manages, empowers, and places individuals with minimal classroom experience while addressing Bay Area teacher shortages. At least 300 teachers have completed the program, which emphasizes both workforce and teacher development.

Read at The Mercury News