In the fall of 2020 the annual Nebraska Teacher Vacancy Survey was made available to all 244 Nebraska public school districts, 17 Nebraska Educational Service Units (ESU), and 178 nonpublic school systems to gather data relating to teacher supply. The information is essential for determining official teacher shortage areas and will be reported to the US Department of Education (USDE) this year for the 2021-22 school year.

Teachers employed to teach in a content area that has been designated as an official teacher shortage area by the USDE may be eligible for federal teacher loan forgiveness opportunities.  NDE does NOT work with federal teacher loan forgiveness programs and individuals seeking information about this must contact the US Department of Education: USDE Student Aid Information Center Website.

The survey of all 439 Nebraska districts/ESU/systems requested the following information:

• the endorsement areas of the positions that were not filled with fully qualified teachers;
• the reasons why the applicant pool was not sufficient;
• what the district/system did to address the unfilled positions.

The list of shortage areas for Nebraska and proposed areas for the USDE for the 2021-22 school year can be found on the NDE Educator Preparation website under the Teacher Shortage Survey link.  You can also access the Full Report and Survey Summary on this website.