Raven Wright revealed at a recent school board meeting how far she would literally go to work in the Pine Bluff School District.
To the gasps of many in the Jordan-Chanay Administration boardroom Monday night, Wright said she began her teaching career driving three hours one way from her home in Sulphur Rock — 9 miles east of Batesville in Independence County — to work, where she teaches 11th grade English at Pine Bluff High School.
“A lot of it had to do with availability,” said Wright, who graduated with an English degree from Batesville’s Lyon College last May. “I was told I was a great teaching candidate but because I was a nontraditional teaching candidate, I would need to pursue my license.”
Having worked with teens through Upward Bound, Wright felt a calling to the profession and switched from majoring to minoring in psychology in the middle of her college career. To attain her education license would require another year of college, she said.
Instead, she signed a three-year contract with the Arkansas Teacher Corps, an office of the University of Arkansas College of Education and Health Professions that helps school districts recruit teachers toward licensure. The contract requires Wright to show she is progressing in the program by practicing for the Praxis exams.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
“When they offered me a position, God just put it in His will,” Wright said.
And she was blessed. She and her boyfriend, who serves in the military, then moved to Searcy, cutting travel to and from Pine Bluff down by about an hour each way.
Now, Pine Bluff is her home. Wright planned to sign a lease agreement with Home Again Pine Bluff, which helps families obtain one of 34 residences, either recently built or soon to be built, in the area of Belair and Auburn drives. Wright’s new residence includes three bedrooms and two bathrooms with a backyard.
Home Again, founded by local pastor Matt Mosler, offers rent below market value, and each renter is encouraged to save the difference in a savings account. Upon completion of teaching locally or serving in the community for three years, as well as financial and home ownership classes, each renter will receive a $20,000 grant toward purchase of the home.
“We needed somehow to attract school teachers in the system who could not only teach ABCs but be there to help students develop in so many ways,” said Mosler, who helped Wright share her story at the invitation of PBSD Superintendent Jennifer Barbaree.
“After two years (of renting) we’ll sell you that house for half of its appraised value, up to $50,000,” Mosler said. “You can go from relative poverty to equity in two years, but we don’t just want to build a house on a bad street. We want to put four or five houses on the same street. The idea is that if you get four or five families on the same street — all go to church, all go to work, all taking care of the neighborhood and all taking care of each other’s families — you change a culture … and make sure kids do their homework.”
None of the people who make Home Again work take a salary, he added.
Barbaree said she was nervous that Wright wouldn’t stay in the PBSD once she was hired but noticed how active and engaged Wright is with her students.
“I’ve actually had some classroom observations in her classroom,” Barbaree said. “She’s really positive, doing great things with our students, and I’ve really gotten to know the Arkansas Teacher Corps program, where she’s provisionally licensed. With her being in that program, I was afraid we might lose her.”
That’s when Barbaree visited the Home Again team, then asked Wright about possibly renting from them.
Now, going to and from school doesn’t take nearly as long as the school day itself for Wright.
“I don’t even know what I’m going to do. I’m going to take up some hobbies,” she said. “I have a dog at home, and I’m sure he doesn’t want to have to stay in a crate all day.”