Teacher shortages and workforce challenges in education

Teacher Shortage

One of the most influential issues in education is teacher shortages, though there is a great deal of debate about the nature of the shortages and the nature of the needed reforms to alter the situation. The situation, as it is, demonstrates a difficult conundrum, as there seems to be an actual surplus of qualified teachers but far to many vacancies to meet the current and future needs. (Voke 2) for this reason it is alarming to suggest possible solutions that would reduce quality such as relaxing teacher certification guidelines, importing teachers from other states and/or nations or fast-tracking teachers

Berry 290) ("Replacing Schools Could Cost" A1)

Neil, and Morgan 41) in any more than an emergency and/or temporary circumstance, those these are suggestions that have been made to solve the teacher shortage. According to a 2002 article in the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development publication InfoBrief, the problem is not that there are to few people to fill the vacancies in school but that there are two few willing to fill the vacancies in the schools where they are needed. The article's author stresses that the nature of the shortage has been misunderstood and that the answer is not to offer greater incentives for choosing teacher training but to properly prepare those candidates already in such programs and in the system to fill the positions needed and stay in them. (Voke 1-17) This trade journal makes it abundantly clear that flooding the system with candidates through incentives that could compromise quality and even make things worse is the wrong answer to the shortage because the shortage has to do with preparedness and willingness rather than availability.

The shortage lies in the distribution of teachers: there are not enough teachers who are both qualified and willing to teach in urban and rural schools, particularly in those schools serving low-income students or students of color. There is also a shortage in certain geographic regions in the country, and there are not enough qualified individuals in particular specialties such as special education, bilingual education, and the sciences (NASBE, 1998; Bradley, 1999). Some also argue that it is not an insufficient production of qualified teacher candidates that causes staff shortage, as conventional analyses maintain, but rather the high rates of teacher turnover (Ingersoll, 2000). (Voke 2)

It is for this reason and many others that the focus of change should be on distribution, teacher recruitment and retention through improvement programs, some of these proposed changes include, support for interstate teacher mobility, rural and urban "grow your own" programs, better pay, working conditions, support and empowerment of existing and new teachers. Quality teachers build quality schools and teach students to achieve greater success.

Blanton, Sindelar, & Correa 115)

Recruitment:

The essential goal of every education system is to provide highly qualified teachers to teach every single student. New legislation has dictated such, though the relative success and/or failure of the regulations in the No Child Left Behind act are debated hotly and in short remain inconclusive they do bring to the forefront the need for quality teachers, especially in undesirable locations and in specialty fields, a fact that the industry has been aware of for years but the public seems to just be realizing. This work will not debate the validity of legislation but will instead focus on the real needs of the industry and the teachers it recruits and retains to teach the growing numbers of students in a system that is demanding smaller class sizes, better teachers and greater accountability. (Voke 1) the education retention expert Barnet Barry points out ten talking points that effect teacher recruitment and retention in hard to staff schools. The first five have to do with what teachers need to be recruited by such places:

Accomplished teachers do not work for weak principals.

Accomplished teachers do not want to work in a school where they cannot use their teaching expertise (and are forced to use highly scripted materials).

Accomplished teachers need the right resources (e.g., classroom libraries, science equipment, current technology) to do their best teaching.

Accomplished teachers would more readily move to low-performing schools if they could do so with "kindred spirits" -- that is, similarly skilled and valued colleagues who have the time to learn from and support one another.

Accomplished teachers would expect -- and labor market forces would require -- salary incentives to teach in hard-to-staff schools. (Barry 290)

To fulfill the staffing goals of hard to staff schools and create a much needed redistribution of quality teachers, challenged schools must uses these five guidelines, when seeking to improve their schools to attract highly skilled teachers. Schools and districts must take not only money, or single minded regulations into consideration when trying to recruit quality teachers, they must also better their schools as proof of their commitment of support.

It is important to understand why people leave the teaching profession a phenomenon that accounts for the fact that there is an actual surplus of qualified teachers in a situation where there are also many vacancies.(Voke 2) Yet it is also important to discuss the reasons they stay. This work will first address the qualities, within the educators themselves and the environment they work within that keeps them where they are once they have been recruited.

The Recruitment and Retention Project (2002) identified three major classes of factors that influence teacher retention: external factors, employment factors, and personal factors. Although external factors including retirement incentives, alternatives outside of teaching, salary, and the availability of other teaching positions impact a teacher's decision to stay or leave the profession, personal factors and employment factors often provide many more compelling reasons.

Inman & Marlow 605)

Teachers who are offered support are the ones who do not leave the profession in the first few years of their entering it. Creating professional environments that build on the strengths of new teachers and those who remain in the profession for many years will clearly assist the education system in the goal of filling a void in the industry, while still maintaining quality.

Beginning teachers can benefit when provided with opportunities to interact and work with (1) teacher education mentors, (2) colleagues with similar ideas about teaching and working cooperatively, (3) administrators who encourage and promote teachers' ideas and (4) a community which feels positive about the educational system and those involved. It is necessary that teacher education programs be proactive and provide support which does not end upon graduation. Support systems within the school environment, provided by teacher education programs and local school administration are an essential element which can be provided. Community members can contribute toward the beginning teacher's feeling of self-worth and thus improve the condition of the classroom environment through active involvement.

Inman & Marlow 615)

According to Inman & Marlow the foundational concepts of teacher retention lay not only in the intrinsic reasons why people retain teaching positions, but also in the manner in which the environment supports them to do so and not surprisingly money is only a small part of this equation.

Teacher recruitment begins with teacher education, as the types of open positions need to be clearly voiced to the new or prospective teacher and then the type of education they receive, especially with regard to specialization must then dictate the real positions available to them. The way in which an organization, such as a school district finds teachers to fill the appropriate voids is through recruitment, beginning as a part of educational support systems. (Inman & Marlow 615) have taught in two hard-to-staff schools -- one for the last 16 years. From my own experience and from what I am hearing now from colleagues, sending accomplished teachers in isolation into hard-to-staff schools with no connections and no authority, even with combat pay, would be just as effective in raising student achievement as having the accomplished teachers dance naked in local churches. -- Alexis, a National Board Certified Teacher and member of the Teacher Leaders Network (www.teacherleaders.org)

Berry 290)

Though this may seem a comical analogy the point is well made as giving teachers little support in particularly demanding environments is likely to leave them feeling as if they should have hit the door running in the other direction.

Retention:

Giving teachers, realistic ideas about the environment that needs them and bolstering support systems is not only essential to recruitment it is essential to retention. The current policy changes, both on a state and federal level have been seeking single format solutions that attempt to create recruitment and retention incentives that are good enough to get people but often fail to keep them.

While the efforts of policy makers to link incentives and school reform agendas are understandable, H.L. Mencken was on target when he wrote that "for every complex problem" there is a solution that is "simple, neat, and wrong." Policies that address the staffing problems of low-performing schools solely through salary incentives or forced assignments are "simple solutions" that ignore the complex conditions that have made it so difficult to recruit and retain expert teachers in the past. Research studies and the insights of accomplished teachers who have helped turn around struggling schools confirm that any effort to recruit and retain accomplished teachers for hard-to-staff schools must be part of a comprehensive plan -- not a separate or stand-alone strategy.

Berry 290)

The foundational point that Berry makes in this article, stresses that the need for recruitment and retention principles that stress a better overall working environment is key to change. Recruiting highly skilled teachers that are board certified requires allowing these teachers the opportunity to see the best possible working environment for their skill set. Berry also makes list of several key ingredients in a multi-faceted solution. The second set of talking points, dictated by Barry, include the remaining five, what quality teachers need in their work environment to stay in challenging schools and help them turn around:

Board-certified teachers need administrators who know and embrace the NBPTS process and cultivate teacher leadership.

Board-certified teachers need smaller "case loads" so they can get to know their students and their families well and have time to work with colleagues.

Board-certified teachers will need to have additional preparation in the area of leadership if they are expected to promote school change.

Board-certified teachers and other teachers already teaching in the school will need professional development in collaboration, team building, and cultural competence.

Board-certified teachers need opportunities to use the NBPTS process to drive new models of professional development and to be more involved in the preparation of the next generation of teachers.

Berry 290)

Using these talking points the idea that the established system is lacking, is obvious as it would seem that the classrooms that need these people and the schools that they are in are not getting them to come or at least come and stay. Solutions that solve the real nature of the "shortage" can be found within Barry's model.

Empowerment:

An aspect of change that is probably most likely to be resisted by schools and districts, is the association with empowerment. What exactly does empowerment mean with regard to teachers? It means giving quality teachers not only a voice in curriculum and school wide decision making but allowing that voice to actually illicit change in areas where they see the need of it. The traditional school and school district has been dictated by a top down policy that gives teachers a rote set of goals and does not allow them to drastically deviate from them. The fear has been that changing curriculum, timing, instructional directions, would create inconsistencies in outcomes and would also take the power away from district administrators and boards.

Teachers are traditionally not given much decision-making power. The educational research and administration communities once tried to provide teachers with "fool-proof," prepackaged curricula, as if teachers' thinking and decision making are not related to improving teaching quality. The data from this study clearly indicate that teachers who feel that they have influence over school and teaching policies are more likely to stay. To empower teachers is one of the ways to improve teacher retention.

Shen 81)

Denying teachers the right to alter things as simple as classroom layout, no to mention curriculum, has created a system that first trains individuals to seek excellence through innovative thought (a concept imparted by their own training) and then figuratively ties their hands behind their backs, making it so they can change and influence nothing. In a beginning teacher situation the result is rather rapid disillusionment and attrition and this may also be the case when a "weak principle" takes the place of one who has traditionally supported teachers in innovation and choice. There is also a good chance that such issues will get worse, rather than better in the next few years as teachers find it increasingly difficult to live under the new dictates of the accountability model of education.