If you pull into Hertford County High School in northeastern North Carolina, pass the bus circle and the soccer fields, and continue to a patch of woods, you find three, cheerful, two-story apartment buildings. Knock on any door here and you'll find the home of a teacher or employee of the local school district.
North Carolina has some of the lowest teacher salaries in the country. Combine that with a housing shortage in this rural county, and that creates a big problem. So local leaders took on both problems at once, by building affordable housing just for school district staff.
"When we started doing a study in Hertford County, we found out that there were only about 15 apartments for teachers ā with the salaries that the teachers made ā [that they] could live in," says James Eure, who led the school system's foundation through the financing and construction of the complex.
[For more of this story, written by Jess Clark, go to http://www.npr.org/sections/ed...chers-will-they-come]
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