As schools welcome students back, administrators are facing a teacher and student shortage. We look at the issues and potential solutions.

AUSTIN, TEXAS, UNITED STATES, August 29, 2023/EINPresswire.com/ -- As K-12 schools across the country welcome students back to the classroom, a twin crisis weighs on school administrators – how to recruit enough teachers to meet their classroom requirements and how to entice the hundreds of thousands of students that have apparently gone AWOL since the covid pandemic to return to school.

As The 2023-2024 School Year Begins, K-12 Education Administrators Are Scrambling To Hire Enough Teachers For Their Classrooms

As students return to school in the fall of 2023, the lack of classroom teachers has become a nationwide problem.

School districts are trying their best to retain their existing teachers and recruit new ones.

Of course, teacher staffing shortages have been a perennial problem for school administrators, who often face difficulties in offering competitive pay.

But in this post-COVID period, the number of teachers entirely quitting the profession is making the situation more dire.

How are schools responding?

There are not many good options. With fewer teachers available, the teachers on staff need to pick up the slack, either by taking on more classes or teaching classrooms packed tight with more students – a recipe for long-term burnout and the potential for creating a vicious circle.

In response, many schools are cutting back on class offerings, canceling non-essential enrichment classes to move teachers into core studies, or allowing trainee teachers to run the classroom. In some cases, there are reports that school districts are calling in school bus drivers to be substitute teachers after their morning transportation runs.

Teacher Shortages Are Especially Problematic In Florida

Florida’s education system has been especially hard hit. According to the Florida Education Association, the state has come up short in hiring 8,000 teachers and 6,000 support staff.

One reason for the shortfall could be the divisive new legislation that has put teachers in the cross-hairs of the current political debates over what gets taught in K-12 schools.

In quite a few cases, Florida teachers are leaving the state or leaving the profession to pursue other careers rather than be subject to firing over what they teach in school or, worse, legal action directed against them.

The nation’s large teacher’s union, the National Education Association, has launched a campaign to counter these new laws targeting teachers, but many fear it is too little too late.

Indeed, there is the potential that the political landscape could become even more radical in the future, with conservative activists calling for the elimination of the federal Department of Education and calling a halt to basic sex education in schools.

How Can We Solve The Teacher Shortage Problem?

So, how can we solve the teacher shortage problem?

The first step is to understand the problem.

According to the 2023 Merrimack College Teacher Survey, there is a major risk the problem is going to get worse. According to their survey, thirty percent of teachers say they will likely quit and find another job in the next two years.

One insight from the survey caught our eye. Teacher satisfaction rates in 2023 are on the rise, particularly among male instructors.

However, millennial teachers (particularly females) are the least satisfied with the teaching profession (only 14% are satisfied). Researchers speculate that the economic pressures of trying to start a family under difficult economic conditions could be the reason for this low satisfaction level compared to older Boomers, Gen X teachers, and younger Gen Z teachers.

In the past, teacher pay was the go-to explanation for problems in recruiting teachers to the field of education.

Here, the situation is mixed. In many cases, teachers are taking on extra summer work to pay the bills, while in six states, the salaries paid to teachers have increased (with more states considering the same). To find the pay rates for teachers in your state, follow this link.

But there may be newer factors at work, such as the dramatic increase in violence and shootings in schools, which is giving teachers pause and leading them to reconsider their career choice.

Take a poignant “love letter” written by a teacher in Baltimore to her students announcing she was leaving the profession. A follow-up interview by Education Week found this teacher had lost more than one of her students to gun violence, and this had taken a serious toll on her mental health.

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Julia Solodovnikova
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