Teacher Shortage Being Addressed by the White House

President Joe Biden has taken an interest in educational issues in the last few months. His next initiative focuses on getting more teachers back in the classroom.

The president recently announced a plan to forgive large amounts of student loan debt for millions of borrowers. He is also working on addressing the many teacher positions left empty at the start of the school year. The Biden Administration is partnering with Indeed, ZipRecruiter, and Handshake to aid school districts in the teacher hiring process. The companies are trying to provide ways for schools to better recruit prospective hires and help connect job openings to teachers.

Not Enough Educators

Schools have been struggling to hire teachers for mathematics, special education, and language arts. In San Francisco, there are 19 classes without a permanent teacher. A spokesperson acknowledged that substitutes filling these classroom vacancies were “not ideal.” Experts say the low pay does not match up with the living expenses in large urban areas. Schools also have to work harder to retain the teachers they currently have.

The shortages are leading to worker burnout amongst instructors left to juggle more classes than normal. John Downs is a school superintendent in Missouri, one of the lowest paying states for teachers on average. He says the pool of qualified applicants has dried up for years now. Poorer districts are offering the four-day work week starting on Tuesdays in an effort to compete. Twenty-five percent of Missouri districts have adopted the four-day schedule, including Downs’ Hallsville School District.

We’re competing against more affluent districts who can offer more lucrative salary benefit packages. So we decided we needed to think outside of the box.

The new school week is also in practice in places like New Mexico, Colorado, Oregon, Idaho, and South Dakota. While many students will be overjoyed with the extra day off, the change has worried some experts. The jury is still out on whether a drop in the number of instructional hours negatively affects student performance.

The Steps Taken by Partner Companies

One way educators can now find job opportunities is through ZipRecruiter’s SchoolJobsNearMe. It is an online portal curated for K-12 schools. They can also attend virtual hiring fairs hosted by Indeed. The college-friendly app Handshake is developing new ways for undergraduates in education to become more aware of job opportunities. These students can attend a virtual Handshake event in October just for those in the education discipline. The CEO of ZipRecruiter, Ian Siegel, recognized that it will take an “all-hands-on-deck” approach to correctly address the teacher shortage.

The shortage of talent in education is a national crisis that could hinder the next generation of Americans: our students. Our nation’s children depend on us, and we must all rise to the occasion.

A White House roundtable on the challenges that teachers face was led by the first lady and educator Jill Biden this past Wednesday. The discussion formally announced the partnerships with the job companies, whose executives were also present. The first lady was also joined by Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, and other government officials. To attract more applicants, local officials have been encouraged to use funds from the American Rescue Plan to increase teacher salaries. The Education and Labor departments stated in a letter that schools could pull from the $480 billion received from the rescue law. Another $100 million in apprenticeship grants for the education sector is being added to Labor Department by the Biden Administration.

Written by Chiagozie Onyewuchi

Sources:

ABC7News: Job search companies to help find solutions to teacher shortages as SF struggles to fill vacancies; by Lyanne Melendez
USA Today: Exclusive: Biden administration partnering with job search companies to help fill teacher shortages; by Alia Wong
Joey Garrison
The New York Times: How Bad Is the Teacher Shortage? Depends Where You Live; by Jacey Fortin and Eliza Fawcett

Featured and Top Image Courtesy of Patrick Q’s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License
Inset Image Courtesy of adonis paul hunter’s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License