State law, 20-A MRSA Section 13013-A subsection 5 & 6; as amended by PL 2012 c. 702, established the National Board Certification Scholarship Fund to encourage teachers to apply to and enroll in the certification program offered by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, or its successor organization.

A school administrative unit or a publicly supported secondary school or Career and Technical Education (CTE) region, may request scholarship funds on behalf of its teachers who meet the requirements.

In fiscal year 2018-19, Maine DOE will allocate $75,000 to the scholarship fund and shall award an amount equal to the cost of the certification program, less any other funds received by the applicant, on a first-come first-served basis to teachers accepted into the certification program.

For more information and eligibility requirements please go to National Board Certification Scholarship.

If you have questions, please contact Denise Towers at Denise.towers@maine.gov or by phone at 624-6863.

The Certification team would like to thank the education field for their assistance in helping to reduce phone calls to the office. The reduction in calls over the past week has allowed the team to input substantially more applications into the system as well as processing applications currently in the system.

This increased efficiency has allowed the amount of open applications to be reduced from 3,000 to 2,300. As school is starting, the certification team would like to alert you that next week between September 4^th through September 7^th the phone hours will be reduced from 6.5 hours per day to 3 hours per day.  This will allow the team additional time to process applications to meet the needs of both educators and districts.

Phone times for September 4 – 7 will be 9AM – 12PM.

On September 10th, phone coverage will resume the typical 6.5 hours a day, from 9AM to 3:30 PM. 

Further updates will be available in the Maine DOE Newsroom, on the Certification webpage, and on Maine DOE’s official Facebook and Twitter pages.

The Maine Department of Education would like to welcome students, educators, and staff back to school as they fill the halls, classrooms and campuses over the coming weeks.

Although there have been many changes in education, both rewarding and challenging, we would like to take a moment to extend our gratitude and appreciation for the hard work, dedication, and determination of education communities throughout the State who go above and beyond to educate the students within their communities.

Our hope is that the 2018 – 2019 school year is filled with new aspirations and exciting learning experiences for students and educators, and collaborative opportunities for the Maine DOE, districts and schools throughout the State.

For more information about how Maine DOE can support schools, educators and students, please visit the Maine Department of Education website, contact the Department at (207) 624-6600, sign up to receive Maine DOE news,  and connect on Maine DOE’s official Facebook and Twitter pages.