Want to teach little kids in Montgomery County? You can earn a degree for free.

Growing up in the 1990s with teaching icons like Ms. Frizzle and Miss Honey, Natalie Morataya always wanted her own classroom. She made worksheets for her little cousin in the summers and played school with her Barbies.

“This has been an ongoing dream for me ever since I was little,” she said.

Morataya, 32, works at John F. Kennedy High School in Wheaton as a paraeducator, an instructional assistant to a teacher. But her modest salary made it hard to pay for the classes she needed to earn a teaching license.

Now she’s on track to become a certified teacher at no cost to her, thanks to a new partnership between Towson University, the Universities at Shady Grove and her employer, Montgomery County Public Schools.

Morataya is part of the first cohort of 15 to 20 paraeducators taking fully paid online, hybrid and night classes toward bachelor’s degrees while still working their day jobs starting this fall. School system leaders hope the program will help with the chronic teacher shortage and fulfill state leaders’ charge to fill teacher vacancies with existing staff. Upon graduation, Morataya and her classmates will be able to teach kids from birth up until the third grade.

Morataya will get her degree through Towson University but attend classes at The Universities at Shady Grove, or USG, in Rockville, where students with associate’s degrees can earn more affordable advanced education from nine Maryland universities that offer classes there. Students are often working professionals with families and need more flexible schedules, said Anne Khademian, the center’s executive director.

Paraeducators in the program get to bypass what they’ve already learned at work, said Laurie Mullen, dean of Towson University’s College of Education. For example, Morataya’s cohort likely won’t spend much time learning how to plan lessons because they see that in action every day.

“We completely changed what we ask them to do for licensure to make it specific to their role as a working professional,” Mullen said.

Paraeducators will still need to complete internships at Montgomery County Public Schools. Those already working in pre-K and early elementary classrooms can knock out that requirement without changing jobs, while students like Morataya can take paid leave to do so.

Officials hope graduates will continue working in the local school system.

“Over 80% of the students, when they graduate from one of our programs, they stay in the region,” Khademian said. “They don’t want to uproot their family and go someplace else.”

Morataya said this program “absolutely” makes her more likely to stay in Montgomery.

According to the Montgomery County Children’s Opportunity Alliance, Maryland lost 26% of its early education workforce between 2019 and 2024, and the industry faces a 12.5% turnover rate, higher than the average of any other field. A lack of teachers makes it harder to open more preschool seats; there are currently only enough licensed seats in child care to serve 59% of the county’s children under 5.

Brittany Ramey, who connects Montgomery school district employees with higher education partnerships, said an early childhood higher education partnership was among the top-requested programs from paraeducators.

“It’s not just about, ‘Oh, I need this to keep my job,’” Ramey said. “It’s ‘I want to be the best professional I can be, the best educator I can be to support our students.’”

About the Education Hub

This reporting is part of The Banner’s Education Hub, community-funded journalism that provides parents with resources they need to make decisions about how their children learn. Read more.