Five community colleges are working with Illinois State University to address the teacher shortage. Illinois Valley, Heartland, Spoon River, Carl Sandburg, and Illinois Central are ISU's partners in CommuniTeach. Illinois Valley Community College Vice President for Academic Affairs Deb Anderson says the community colleges act like feeder schools to ISU. ISU will offer part-time and partly online coursework on the path to teacher certification.
Community colleges will begin their classes in CommuniTeach this fall. The first classes at ISU begin in the fall of 2022. The plan is to have the first graduates teaching in 2025.