RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A scholarship program meant to attract North Carolina's brightest high school students into teaching has fallen victim to state budget cuts.

Legislators voted to phase out the $13.5 million annual funding for the Teaching Fellows program as they closed a $2.5 billion budget shortfall before adjourning last week, The News & Observer of Raleigh reported Sunday. The 25-year-old program copied by other states provided a free college education in exchange for teaching at least four years in a North Carolina classroom.

Its graduates work as teachers and principals in 99 counties across the state.

"It's easy to spot them," said Brian Whitson, a 35-year-old chemistry teacher at Salisbury High School, who was a Teaching Fellow. "You see a lot of innovation. A lot of them are able to motivate students in a way other teachers are not."

But this year's entering college freshman class will be the last to receive the scholarships. Legislators say they had to decide whether to make direct cuts to the classroom or to other education programs.

Two Republican lawmakers suggest funding could be restored in future sessions.

"Our goal was to have a teacher in every classroom and a teacher assistant," said Re. Bryan Holloway of King, co-chairman of the House committee that oversees education spending. "With the economic climate, you have to make tough decisions. ... The hope is when we go back in the short session (next May), we could turn things around a bit."

As it stands, however, the program is being phased out, cutting $210,000 for the fiscal year that started July 1 and $3.4 million the following year.

Former four-term Democratic Gov. Jim Hunt said North Carolina has been an innovator in teacher training partly because of such programs, and he hopes funding is restored.

The program was created in 1986 at the urging of Democratic Lt. Gov. Bob Jordan, with backing from Hunt and the late superintendent of Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools. They were concerned that too many of the brightest high school students were pursuing careers other than teaching, and were also worried by a lack of males and minorities entering the profession.

The program provides students full scholarships to 17 participating campuses. Students who don't fulfill their teaching obligation must pay back the scholarship, with 10 percent interest. The roughly 500 students accepted into the program annually are required to attend seminars, take a weeklong bus tour across the state to learn its cultures, and participate in public service projects and other programs.

The average SAT score for students in the program this year was 200 points higher than North Carolina's average SAT score. Of its graduates who started teaching 20 years ago, 60 percent are still working in North Carolina schools, according to the program.

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Information from: The News & Observer, http://www.newsobserver.com