(1) Subject to available appropriations, up to one hundred teaching fellows per year, selected as provided in subsection (2) of this section, shall receive financial assistance in the form of a stipend in the amount of ten thousand dollars disbursed during the fellowship year. As provided in section 23-78-305 (3), the teaching fellow must choose whether the stipend is awarded as state-based financial aid or as wages for employment. In either case, the stipend is awarded without regard to need and is in addition to any other financial assistance that may be available to the teaching fellow. A teaching fellow may apply the stipend to pay the costs of attendance during the year in which he or she participates in the teaching fellowship program. (2) The teaching fellowship stipends shall be paid fifty percent by the department of higher education from the amount appropriated for this part 3 and fifty percent by the participating institution of higher education. An institution of higher education that participates in a teaching fellowship program shall notify the department of higher education of the enrollment of each student who enters into a teaching fellowship program. Based on the level of chronic hiring difficulty and financial need demonstrated by each participating rural local education provider, the department shall annually select up to one hundred students enrolled in teaching fellowship programs to receive the stipend and shall forward to the institution fifty percent of the amount of the stipend for each selected student. The institution shall provide the remaining fifty percent of the stipend and disburse one hundred percent of each stipend to the selected teaching fellows as provided in section 23-78-305 (2)(c). (3) If, upon completion of a teaching fellowship program, a teaching fellow does not accept an offer of employment made by the participating rural local education provider, or does not complete two full school years of employment as required in section 23-78-305 (3), the teaching fellow must repay the amount received as a stipend during the teaching fellowship year in accordance with terms established by the participating institution of higher education, and upon receipt of repayment the institution shall refund to the department of higher education the amount of the stipend. (4) The general assembly shall annually appropriate to the department of higher education the amount required to implement the teaching fellowship programs as provided in this part 3. Any unexpended and unencumbered money from an appropriation made for the purposes of this part 3 for a state fiscal year commencing prior to July 1, 2020, remains available for expenditure by the department for the purposes of this part 3 and for the purposes of sections 23-76-104 and 23-76-106 in the next fiscal year without further appropriation.
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