Three south San Antonio school districts joined forces this year to split the cost to bring summer training sessions to teachers, allowing teachers to interact while learning new information for one-third of the price districts pay to train teachers individually.

This was the second year that East Central and Southside independent school districts trained teachers together, but the pair added Harlandale to the mix this year to offer almost 90 classes for teachers, some of whom had to take training to meet state and district requirements.

“We all needed staff development, but since we were all on such a tight budget, there wasn''t much to do,” said Samantha Gallegos, Harlandale''s director of secondary curriculum. “We started getting together in April to determine our biggest needs, and what would have cost us $60,000 alone ended up costing each district only $13,000, which was awesome for all of us.”

About 750 teachers from the three districts have taken courses offered during the summer training. Sessions are free to all teachers, and one district, East Central, is paying participating teachers an $80 daily stipend, said Tripp Presley, the district''s director of elementary curriculum. Southside teachers will get two vacation days before Thanksgiving if they take two summer courses; Harlandale isn''t offering any incentives, which training instructors say wasn''t necessary anyway.