Two Dartmouth juniors, Lloyd Lee and Zola Mashariki, have received a national award that provides financial support to minority students who plan to teach in public schools.
Each will receive up to $18,000 from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund Fellowship between the summer of their junior year and the start of their teaching careers. A $2,500 stipend will be allocated for summer projects related to teaching and yearly stipends of $6,000 to $8,000 for full-time graduate work in education.
Lee and Mashariki were two of 25 students chosen from 13 colleges and universities nationwide on the basis of their "academic standing, writing and interviewing skills, eagerness, sense of self and commitment to community and experience with young people," said Caroline Zinsser, the grant's program officer.
Students apply to the program along with a "mentor" -- a faculty member or administrator who helps the student in his or her studies and graduate school selection, Zinsser said.
Rockefeller Brothers Fund President Colin G. Campbell said that "the Fund was particularly delighted by the quality, enthusiasm and promise of the individuals who applied, especially in light of the acute shortage of minority teachers."
Fewer than 10 percent of teachers are minorities. If current trends continue, minorities will comprise more than one-third of school enrollments but only five percent of teachers by the end of the decade, according to Zinsser.
Lee said many minority students lack role models in the public school system today.
"A large number of students of color do not have teachers that can relate to them," Lee said. "Most teachers come from different backgrounds than students they teach. They do not relate to them as well as maybe a person who knows about the different stages in life they go through, as minorities could."
Lee will work as a teaching assistant and resident adviser at a University of New Mexico summer academic program that prepares young Native Americans for technical and managerial roles.
The fellowship program only accepts students majoring in the liberal arts who do not pursue undergraduate degrees in education.
"Statistics tell us that the grades of students in the liberal arts are typically higher than students in undergraduate education programs," Zinsser said. "We also think that people make better teachers when they are well-grounded in the liberal arts."
"We are hoping to recruit people who might not otherwise think of teaching, and the fellowship might encourage them to think about it," Zinsser added.
So far all of the fellows have stayed with the program. "We are very gratified to find out how dedicated these students are," Zinsser said. "It is not easy to find such wonderful people who could probably enter another profession for a lot more money but who have such a sense of commitment to the community."
The fund also gives students up to $1,200 annually for the first three years that the fellow continues in the teaching profession to assist in paying debts from college.
"I had considered teaching in a nonchalant way, but the money definitely made me think about it again," Lee said. "Grad school costs a lot, and I thought this was a great opportunity."
After completing his education, Lee said he would like to go back to the Navajo reservation where he is from and teach.
The fellows program began in 1990 with the selection of the participating institutions. Currently there are 23 participating schools but the program is expanding to 25 this summer, said Miriam Anesis, a program assistant.
The program's first fellowship winners will begin graduate school in September. Darryl Begay '93 was one of the original fellows.
"We have had terrific graduate program acceptances and scholarships so far," Zinsser said.
