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November 2007 Of the 13 million children growing up in poverty today, about half will graduate from high school. Those that do graduate will perform, on average, at an eighth-grade level. Educational inequity is our nation's greatest injustice—and you can help solve it.
What the Experience is Really Like 
- Mythbusters: All first-year teachers experience a steep learning curve. However, Teach For America corps members say that our five-week training institute helped prepare them for the challenges they experienced during their first year of teaching.
Read more about Teach For America training>>
- Video report from the field: “There’s this really honest moment that you have to have with yourself when you’re in a [classroom] . . . and you’ve got a lot of work to do. It’s hard. But as someone who really enjoys a challenge, I’ve got to say—there’s nothing like it.”—Linda Mendez (Houston Corps ’05)
Hear more from Linda and other corps members who offer an inside look at life in the classroom and in the corps>>
- Developing your skills: Highly effective teachers in under-resourced schools employ the same skills required for success in any profession. You will build these skills during your Teach For America training and ongoing professional development>>
How this Fits in with Your Career Goals - Not just for graduating seniors: If you’re enrolled in a graduate program or you’re a college graduate working in the public or private sector and you want to be a powerful force in the lives of others, consider joining Teach For America.
Learn more from individuals who joined Teach For America after graduate school or after time in other professions>>
- Graduate school partnerships: Top-ranked graduate programs, including Georgetown University’s Public Policy Institute and Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Graduate Program in Chemistry, offer deferrals and other benefits to Teach For America teachers.
View the full list of Teach For America graduate school partnerships>>
- Employer partnerships: Google, Goldman Sachs, GE, and many other top companies offer two-year deferrals, summer internships, and signing bonuses to Teach For America corps members and alumni.
View the list of Teach For America's job deferrals>>
- Teach For America alumni impact: “Very early in my Teach For America experience, I realized that poor health, nutrition, and a lack of access to adequate medical services negatively impacted my students’ ability to achieve in school. This reality played a large part in my decision to pursue medicine as another way to serve my students.”—Prasanna Jagannathan (Los Angeles Corps ’98), Internal Medicine Resident, University of California, San Francisco; Harvard University ’06 M.D.; University of California, Berkeley, ’98 B.A.
Learn more about the impact of Prasanna and other alumni in a variety of fields>>
Career Spotlight: Law - Experience that counts: “It is easy as a law student to treat our studies as abstract analytical exercises, but underneath each case we read is a real story involving the frustrated hopes of some flesh-and-blood human being. With this in mind, it is central to the task of any lawyer, in whatever field, to be able to think in terms of the interests of his client and to put those interests ahead of his own. My experience as a teacher has prepared me to see this human dimension and to accept the responsibility that comes with it.”— Nick Pyati (New York City Corps ’05), J.D. candidate at Yale Law School, Stupski scholarship recipient
Read more about Nick’s path to law school>>
- Yale Law School scholarship and benefits: Two applicants who defer their acceptance to Yale Law School to join Teach For America will each receive a $30,000 Stupski Scholarship for Civic Leadership.
Read more about Yale Law School and the Stupski scholarship>>
- What law schools think: “At Harvard Law School, we look for passion, energy, and social awareness in our students, and we’ve found these qualities consistently in Teach For America alumni. They share our commitment to law as public service and we’re confident that they’ll use the resources and opportunities available here to go out and change the world.”—Elena Kagan, Dean and Charles Hamilton Houston Professor, Harvard Law School
Top law schools value the commitment, leadership skills, and social awareness that Teach For America alumni bring. Read more about Teach For America’s law school partnerships>>
Regional Spotlight: Greater New Orleans “At what other point in your lives have you had the opportunity to literally write history—to change the course of history? That is the moment we are living here in Greater New Orleans, and you feel it every day.”— Kira Orange-Jones (South Louisiana Corps '00), Executive Director, Teach For America-Greater New Orleans
Learn more in a video spotlight on Greater New Orleans>>Send to a friend · Contact us Opinions expressed in this document or linked documents are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Teach For America, the Corporation for National Service, or the AmeriCorps program. 
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