Is the ancient, lifelong memory of the teacher dying out? Are we simply to accept that long ago were the days when educators entered the teaching profession with aspirations of remaining in the classroom until retirement? Why are teachers leaving? Can we come up with a solution to promote prestige and attract people back to the teaching profession? While many sectors of education are experiencing teacher shortages, teacher retention in particular is a critical concern in many schools and districts across the nation. The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) requires that all teachers be “highly qualified,” meaning that teachers are trained and certified before entering the classroom. These “highly qualified” teachers are usually the product of various university certification programs in which they acquire pedagogical knowledge indispensable for educational applications of academic content areas, as well as related information on ethics, state laws, and educational research. Before receiving their hard-earned title of certified teacher, “highly qualified” teachers must successfully pass a series of state exams. However, most, but not all, certification programs include a student teaching component in which aspiring teachers serve a short apprenticeship in a classroom with a teacher who is expert in their respective academic areas. This student teaching experience provides the opportunity to observe and practice the effective implementation of content knowledge, instructional skills, and classroom management in a “real world” context. Unfortunately, classroom training rarely mimics the complicated stress associated with real-life application of a trade, and, comparable to most careers, teaching is a very difficult profession to... of higher morale and manageable stress than to non-CFG participants. References Buckley, Schneider, and Shang (2005). Fix it and they might stay: School facility quality and teacher retention in the Washington DC Teachers College Record, 107, 1107-1123. Cookson, P. W. (2005). Your First Year: A Community of Teachers. Teaching Pre K-8, 35, 12-13. Feiman-Nemser, S. (2003). What new teachers need to learn. Educational Leadership, 60, 25-29. Ingersoll, R. M., & Smith, T. M. (2003). The wrong solution to the teacher shortage. Educational Leadership, 60, 30-33. Johnson, S. M., & Kardos, S. M. (2002). Keeping new teachers in mind. Educational Leadership, 59, 12-16.Wilheim, Dewhurst,-Savelis, and Gordon (2000). Teacher stress? An analysis of why teachers leave and why they stay. Teachers and teaching: theory and practice, 6, 291-304.