ROCK HILL— With new and innovating methods, the Center for Educator Recruitment, Retention, and Advancement (CERRA) continues to seek avenues to improve the flow of communication among teachers across the Palmetto State. CERRA has launched a peer-to-peer online message board and believes it will increase collaboration among teachers through the user-friendly forums.

“The idea for this project came directly from teachers on our CERRA Advisory Board last fall and we believe this new communication tool will be well-received and highly used by teachers across the state to connect with one another to discuss issues relevant to their classrooms,“ said Public Information Coordinator Mychal Frost.

“The exciting aspect of the message board is the ability for a teacher in the Upstate who has never met a teacher from the Lowcountry to share ideas and methods,” he added.

The site is open to any South Carolina educator who registers by creating a username and password; site-content is not viewable by non-registered viewers. After joining the message board users will be able to add “threads,” or discussion topics, within the broad categories on the site: Teacher Cadets, Teaching Fellows, State Teacher Forum, Mentoring and Induction, and National Board Certified Teachers (and those seeking certification). Additionally, forums are set-up to allow the discussion of topics related to each of CERRA’s five regions: Upstate, Savannah River, Midlands, Pee Dee, and Lowcountry. Elementary school, middle school, and high school categories have been added to cater to specific discussions by teachers at each level.

The message board can be accessed from the “Message Board” link on the CERRA home page at www.cerra.org. Take advantage of this new medium of communication now available through CERRA.

CERRA, an independent state agency located on the campus of Winthrop University, is the oldest and most established teacher recruitment program in the country. The purpose of CERRA is to provide leadership in identifying, attracting, placing and retaining well-qualified individuals for the teaching profession in South Carolina. CERRA’s programs have been adopted at school, district and state levels in more than 30 states in the United States.