Teach for Bulgaria is looking for partnering schools in 13 regions of Bulgaria for the new cohort of Program teachers to start working in as of September 2017. The schools in Vratsa, Veliko Tarnovo, Lovech, Montana, Pazardjik, Pernik, Pleven, Plovdiv, Razgrad, Sliven, Sofia Municipality, Sofia Region and Stara Zagora, can submit their applications for teachers at Teach for Bulgaria’s web site (www.zaednovchas.bg) by 10 April. The non-governmental organization is looking to partner with schools in which the participants in the Program would be most useful to students and local communities. The organization is working with municipal and state schools where the managers are facing many challenges in classrooms, conscious of their responsibility, and despite the difficulties they are constantly looking for new ways to transform their students.

“We want to partner with schools where students have learning difficulties, show unsatisfactory results from external assessment, have low motivation to learn and are at risk of dropping out of the education system. Nevertheless, the teams of teachers in these places do not stop working hard and purposefully to provide quality education for every child,” Nelly Koleva, Chief Officer of Public Partnerships at Teach for Bulgaria, says.

Schools may fill in both the secure positions for which they will need teachers starting September 2017 in their applications for partnership with Teach for Bulgaria and also the positions that are not yet certain and will be confirmed at a later stage.

In the current 2016/2017 school year, Teach for Bulgaria successfully collaborated with 88 partner schools in 10 regions across the country. From the next year, the organization is also planning to work for the first time with schools in three more regions — Veliko Tarnovo, Pleven and Sliven. Since 2010, 119 teachers have gone through the Program, with 70% of them continuing to be involved in the field of education.

A major mission of Teach for Bulgaria is to overcome educational inequalities in Bulgaria and provide quality education for every child. To this end, the organization attracts, educates and supports within two years successful professionals outside the education sphere and socially committed people to become teachers and change the lives of the children they work with. Participants in the Program have a focus in their work to motivate students achieve better results and develop their potential. They are ready to teach in small towns and villages, where teachers are the hardest to find and thus provide children in need with access to quality education. During the two-year Program of Teach for Bulgaria, participants receive targeted training and support for their work at school. They further develop their professional and personal qualities, which prepares them to be successful leaders in the educational system and society. Teach for Bulgaria is partnering with Plovdiv University “Paisii Hilendarski” in the training and acquisition of pedagogical qualification of the participants in the Program.

The organization is also working successfully with a number of other public partners in the field of education — the Ministry of Education, regional departments of education, professional unions of teachers and principals, many other non-governmental organizations and institutions at local and national levels.