TEACH Grant Program
March 02, 2009
Students in The Jeannine Rainbolt College of Education at the University of Oklahoma who plan to pursue a career in classroom teaching may be eligible for significant financial assistance through a program created by Congress.
The College Cost Reduction and Access Act created the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program that provides grants of up to $4,000 per year to students who intend to teach in a public or private elementary or secondary school that serves students from low-income families.
Below, you can find conditions, requirements, and other important information concerning the TEACH Grant program. If you are interested applying for a grant, contact the University of Oklahoma Financial Aid Services office.
Conditions
In exchange for receiving a TEACH Grant, you must agree to serve as a full-time teacher in a high-need field in a public or private elementary or secondary school that serves low-income students (see below for more information on high-need fields and schools serving low-income students). As a recipient of a TEACH Grant, you must teach for at least four academic years within eight calendar years of completing the program of study for which you received a TEACH Grant. IMPORTANT: If you fail to complete this service obligation, all amounts of TEACH Grants that you received will be converted to a Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford Loan. You must then repay this loan to the U.S. Department of Education. You will be charged interest from the date the grant(s) was disbursed.
Student Eligibility Requirements
To receive a TEACH Grant you must meet the following criteria:
- Complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), although you do not have to demonstrate financial need.
- Be a U.S. citizen or eligible non-citizen.
- Be enrolled as an undergraduate, post-baccalaureate, or graduate student in a postsecondary educational institution that has chosen to participate in the TEACH Grant Program.
- Be enrolled in coursework that is necessary to begin a career in teaching or plan to complete such coursework. Such coursework may include subject area courses (e.g., math courses for a student who intends to be a math teacher).
- Meet certain academic achievement requirements (generally, scoring above the 75th percentile on a college admissions test or maintaining a cumulative GPA of at least 3.25).
- Sign a TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve (see below for more information on the TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve).
High-Need Field
High-need fields are the specific areas identified below:
- Bilingual Education and English Language Acquisition
- Foreign Language
- Mathematics
- Reading Specialist
- Science
- Special Education
- Other identified teacher shortage areas as of the time you begin teaching in that field. These are teacher subject shortage areas (not geographic areas) that are listed in the Department of Education’s Annual Teacher Shortage Area Nationwide Listing. To access the listing, please go to http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ope/pol/tsa.doc.
Schools Serving Low-Income Students
Schools serving low-income students include any elementary or secondary school that is listed in the Department of Education’s Annual Directory of Designated Low-Income Schools for Teacher Cancellation Benefits. To access the Directory, please go to www.tcli.ed.gov and click on the SEARCH button.
Teach Grant Agreement to Serve
Each year you receive a TEACH Grant, you must sign a TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve that will be available electronically on a Department of Education website. The TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve specifies the conditions under which the grant will be awarded, the teaching service requirements, and includes an acknowledgment by you that you understand that if you do not meet the teaching service requirements you must repay the grant as a Federal Direct Unsubsidized Loan, with interest accrued from the date the grant funds were disbursed. Specifically, the TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve will require the following:
- For each TEACH Grant-eligible program for which you received TEACH Grant funds, you must serve as a full-time teacher for a total of at least four academic years within eight calendar years after you completed or withdrew from the academic program for which you received the TEACH Grant.
- You must perform the teaching service as a highly-qualified teacher at a low-income school. The term highly-qualified teacher is defined in section 9101(23) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 or in section 602(10) of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act.
- Your teaching service must be in a high-need field.
- You must comply with any other requirements that the Department of Education determines to be necessary.
- If you do not complete the required teaching service obligation, TEACH Grant funds you received will be converted to a Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford Loan that you must repay, with interest charged from the date of each TEACH Grant disbursement.
Additional Guidance and Implementing Regulations
The Department of Education will publish regulations to implement the TEACH Grant Program after providing an opportunity for public comment in accordance with legal requirements.
IMPORTANT REMINDER
If you receive a TEACH Grant but do not complete the required teaching service, as explained above, you will be required to repay the grants as a Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford Loan, with interest charged from the date of each TEACH Grant disbursement.
Next Steps
Students interested in the TEACH Grant program should contact the program coordinator in their major area for more details. Program coordinators are as follows:
- Math Education: Stacy Reeder - 325-3533
- Science Education: Ed Marek - 325-5723 or 325-1498
- Reading Education: Jiening Ruan - 325-4204
- Special Education: David Lovett - 325-1507
- Foreign Language: Teresa Bell- 325-6181
Process for Fall 2009
The federal government has made a change in their process which will affect the students seeking Teach Grants. The current 7 step process we now follow will need to be adjusted due to the changes. The adjustments will be in the current process steps 6 and 7.
How to proceed now:
After talking with the program coordinator the student will submit the counseling form, signed by their coordinator, to Financial Aid Services.
Financial Aid Services will review forms, verify information, and award the TEACH grant.
The student will receive an email from Financial Aid Services indicating awards have been updated. They will be instructed to go to ozone.ou.edu to review their awards. At this time they will see the TEACH grant on the Financial Aid Notification. No action needs to be taken by the student at this time.
Financial Aid Services will be sending a computer file to the United States Department of Education each Monday that will include all TEACH awards from the past week. The following day the student should go online to the US DOE website: https://teach-ats.ed.gov/ats/index.action to complete an electronic version of the Agreement to Serve Form. *
After electronically signing the Agreement to Serve form, the OU financial aid office will be notified by the Department of Education and will then proceed to disburse the student TEACH award to the student's Bursar account.
Students should expect to receive disbursement of funds approximately two weeks after completing the Agreement to Serve Form.
* NOTE: This means if a student submits their counseling form and the Teach Grant award is made on Tuesday, September 1, the request would be sent to the Department of Education on Monday, September 7 and the Agreement to serve form would be available to the student on Tuesday, September 8.
Disclaimer
This fact sheet provides a preliminary summary of the TEACH Grant Program based on the College Cost Reduction and Access Act of 2007. The information in this document is subject to change and is not binding on the Department of Education.
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