EIU Rural School Initiative

Meet M Cecil Smith
New GYO Program Director

I am M Cecil Smith, Ph.D., and I am the new Program Director for the Grow Your Own (GYO) teacher education program in the College of Education at EIU. Prior to this appointment, I served as Dean of the School of Education at Southern Illinois University Carbondale where I also led a GYO program. Following a 36-year academic career as a faculty member and administrator across three universities, I retired from SIU in July, 2024. Serving as GYO Program Director at EIU launches my “encore career” in education.

The State of Illinois was the pioneer in the development of “grow your own teachers” programs, which have now spread to many U.S. states. In the early 2000s, community-based organizations in Chicago were concerned with the teacher shortages that characterized neighborhood schools. Recognizing the tremendous talent and obvious passion for education among community members and non-instructional school staff, and the need for a more diverse teacher workforce, these organizations lobbied the state legislature to support home-grown efforts to recruit and prepare racially diverse and community-connected individuals to teach in hard-to-staff schools.

In 2005, the Grow Your Own Teacher Education Act passed the Legislature and, in 2006, a consortium of community-based organizations won state funding for the Grow Your Own initiative with a $1.5 million planning grant. Then, in 2007, legislators allocated $3 million to launch the program and grants were distributed to community groups, school districts, and universities. Once funded, a nonprofit organization was created -- Grow Your Own Illinois (GYO IL) – and it was selected by the Illinois State Board of Education to develop a GYO initiative statewide. 

I first became aware of the GYO IL initiative about 15 years ago when I was a professor in the College of Education at Northern Illinois University. Although I was not involved in undergraduate teacher preparation at that time, I was very interested to learn more about GYO due to my scholarly interests in adult learning and development and adult education. GYO’s focus on preparing non-traditional adult learners for careers as classroom teachers struck me as an important and timely response to the teacher shortage throughout Illinois. While leading our School’s GYO effort at SIU, I was impressed by the enthusiasm and commitment to education among the students in the program. I expect that I will find similar responses among the College’s GYO students and I look forward to meeting them.

At EIU, two cohorts of paraprofessionals--one in Special Education in Jasper County and the other in Elementary Education in Vermillion—were recruited in 2019. Our GYO program then expanded two years later, offering both programs in Champaign. Our off-campus cohorts are targeted to racially diverse working adults, offering them a variety of professional learning opportunities. Today, the College of Education continues to receive funding from GYO IL to recruit, support, and prepare adult community members and school staff to earn the undergraduate education degree and an Illinois teaching license.

It is important that the College leadership team work consistently to “spread the word” about the GYO IL program. Regional Offices of Education, local school districts, and a variety of community-based agencies and groups are essential partners with the College of Education in this effort. GYO IL is also launching a statewide marketing effort to raise awareness about the GYO mission and to inform the public about the resources—financial aid, tutoring, professional development—that GYO provides to qualified teacher candidates. Simply put, GYO IL awards up to $25 thousand dollars to candidates in the form of a forgivable loan. Once certified, these newly prepared GYO teachers commit to working in hard-to-staff schools for a period of five years. Once the commitment is fulfilled, the loan is forgiven.

Many GYO students want to “network” and increase their chances of being hired in a school district. Often, the best resource for professional networking is the GYO students themselves. Specifically, many GYO students currently work as paraprofessionals or in other school staff positions; so, they already have important “connections” within their respective school districts. One of the things that we can do is to help our students to leverage those connections and relationships to yield job offers for teaching positions once they graduate and have earned their teaching licenses.

Also, there are numerous professional development workshops and teaching-focused conferences offered throughout the State of Illinois for aspiring and professional educators. Attending such programs and meetings is a great way to network with school leaders, possibly leading to job offers. As GYO program director, I’d like to look into ways that the College might provide additional funding to our GYO students to help them attend these events.