Washington State Policy Spotlight: A Multifaceted Approach to Grow Your Own Pathways

This article describes Washington's Grow Your Own (GYO) programs as a strategy for increasing the state's supply of bilingual and diverse teachers. GYO programs recruit and prepare future educators from underserved populations to teach in their communities. These strategies include alternative routes to certification, pathways for paraeducators, and offering targeted courses in high schools. In addition to solving the state's teacher shortages and increasing educator diversity, these efforts have the potential to increase the supply of bilingual educators who can provide ELs with academic content instruction in ELs' home languages.