This amendment provides $500,000 the second year from the general fund for grants to eligible Virginia universities' education schools and Petersburg and Norfolk school divisions to begin a Teacher Residency program. These two new programs will be modeled after the one currently in place between VCU and Richmond City school division, which has been in existence since 2010, and is an intensive, school-based teacher preparation training program. The program is designed to help address the unique challenges of teaching in an urban environment. JLARC, in its June 2014 study of Low Performing Schools in Urban High Poverty Communities,recommended expanding the teacher residency program model to additional school divisions, such as Petersburg and Norfolk.