By LINDA BATTLES
Regional Vice President
WGU South Region

We at Western Governors University (WGU) would like to applaud the New Mexico Higher Education Department who provided debt relief for more than 600 more teachers this year.

This support was influential in filling close to 350 teaching positions in New Mexico, but there are still vacancies, leaving our students without certified teachers in their classrooms.

To address this shortage, we need to make sure we invest in and support our teachers. One way to do this is to help them earn their degree efficiently and cost-effectively. At Western Governors University, a non-profit online university, designed to fit the lives of busy adults through competency-based education, we’re doing our part by making sure our future educators can earn their teaching degrees at about half the cost of other comparable institutions in the U.S. – and at their own pace. WGU’s School of Education graduated more than 9,187 students nationwide between September 2021 and June 2022.

We not only want teachers to be good educators, but we also want them to be successful professionals with little debt and room for continued growth. Let’s work together in New Mexico to ensure we have an abundant supply of this critical workforce.