There are several avenues for receiving licensure in other states. There are official agreements between Tennessee and 40 other states. Some states will grant a license for any teacher who has completed a nationally accredited program. Still other states require a transcript analysis for teachers who come into their state with a license from another state. In all cases, as far as our records show, our graduates have been able to use their Tennessee license to become licensed in any other state or foreign country.
All states require completion of applications and testing requirements.
It is highly recommended that everyone in the teaching profession be licensed. Most also require, though, that the non-licensed teacher becomes licensed within a prescribed period of time. If you are licensed in the state in which you teach at a private, state-approved school, your years of teaching at the private school may be recognized by the state if you later teach in the public school system. For example in Tennessee, if you teach for two years in a private, state-approved school after you become licensed and you then sign a contract to teach in a public school in that state, your two years of teaching experience may be counted toward your salary and level of licensure in the public sector. If you were not licensed during that two years of teaching, the state would not count those years.