We know they can’t raise a family on that amount of money,” Pringle said. The NEA report on pay also showed that 40 percent of education support professionals (ESP) nationwide - like interventionists or special education aides - make less than $25,000 a year. “Excellent recruitment really supports retaining teachers over time,” she said, because “one of the strongest predictors of whether or not a teacher will remain in their classroom is how supportive they find their school leaders.” ”We’re constantly in a recruitment format and we’re really starting to look at nontraditional candidates because we know there are not enough traditional graduates coming out of education programs,” Reid said, “so we’re also being asked to look at career switchers.”īut as school administrations pivot to prioritizing staffing up with new teachers, Carver-Thomas said, retaining educators is also critical because high teacher turnover makes it difficult to create a stable school environment, which “has a detrimental impact on student achievement.” Reid says the shortages forced Fairfax County to change its hiring approach in many ways, including pivoting from seasonal recruiting to year-round recruiting. Teacher resignations in Fairfax jumped 45 percent last year compared to average resignation rates from 2018 to 2020, according to a Washington Post analysis. “Many of our teachers currently actually take a second job to support their families, and that’s, I think, a real challenge for our staff,” Reid said. Michelle Reid, the superintendent of Fairfax County Public Schools in Northern Virginia, oversees more than 13,000 teachers in one of the largest school systems in the country. Watch the video in the player above.Īdministrators have also been feeling the pressure to recruit and retain teachers. PBS NewsHour digital anchor Nicole Ellis spoke with education experts across the country on challenges with teacher pay and what it means for retention. “Shortages are a massive problem on the national scale,” said Desiree Carver-Thomas, a researcher at the Learning Policy Institute, adding, “we see shortages in almost every state when it comes to math, science and special education.” Pringle says the compounding effects of a “lack of professional pay, lack of respect, lack of time, and lack of resources,” has made it hard to keep teachers and disincentivizes college graduates from pursuing careers in education to begin with. Pandemic-related stress and burnout were also factors. Pay is one of the leading reasons teachers have said they are leaving the profession, according to a 2022 NEA survey, which found that nearly 55 percent of teachers were considering leaving the profession earlier than they’d planned. “Overall, over these last 10 years, salaries have actually declined,” she said. But while the 2.5 percent increase is significant, average overall teacher salaries have struggled to keep up, especially with inflation, NEA President Becky Pringle said. This positive impact is crucial as student math and reading scores decline across the country.New teacher salaries rose by more than they had in a decade during the 2021-2022 school year, according to a recent report by the National Education Association (NEA). Department of Education, student achievement increases as much as 21 percent when their teachers participate in professional development programs and adopt different techniques to deliver instruction. When teachers are encouraged to support each other, they learn new ways to excel in their classroom, improving instruction.īy investing in their teachers, districts directly invest in their students. More than half of teachers consider collaboration with colleagues the most effective type of professional development. Workshops and peer groups provide a creative outlet for teachers to lean on each other for advice. New and seasoned teachers can level up their skills and work toward subject mastery. It exposes educators to the latest instructional methods, offering research-based best practices and providing the confidence to teach new concepts. Professional development, however, is one powerful tool that can alleviate some of the pressure and help reduce teacher turnover.Ĭontinuing education and career training make up a vital part of the educational process. Key contributors to educators leaving the field include a lack of preparation, mentoring and support.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |