Catalyst Chicago has been reporting on Chicago education for twenty-five year, operating as "an independent news organization that serves as a watchdog and resource for school improvement in Chicago." While they do offer plenty of space to features like guest writers plugging the awesomeness of reform, their news coverage is pretty balanced-- they do not appear to have any requirement that their reporters never cover bad news about charters.
But last week Catalyst ran the fluffiest piece of fluffery ever in Maureen Kelleher's paean to Arne Duncan. Surely this is not going to be the narrative that anyone pushes about Duncan as he approaches his post-federal earning years.
First, Kelleher flashes back to Duncan's elevation to the head job of Chicago schools (he was successor to Paul Vallas). Duncan's big success-- adopting a tracking method for freshmen. On the other hand...
Duncan also championed expanding school choice and lent new urgency to
the work of transforming struggling high schools -- initiatives that
drew heat from the political left. These efforts had more mixed results.
No kidding.
Next we move on to Duncan's career as Secretary of Education in, perhaps, some parallel universe.
Duncan has encouraged states to innovate around accountability systems, offering waivers from No Child Left Behind’s rules.
This is true in much the same way it's true that a mugger encourages you to put your hands up and offers to take all of your cash. To talk about the waiver program as if it was a mild suggestion, even a favor, to state systems, is to miss the whole point. States, over a financial barrel, and looking at the unachievable goals of NCLB (100% above average by 2014), had a choice about accepting Duncan's offer in the same way that apartment dwellers have a choice about whether or not to pay the rent.
Finally, we look into Duncan's future.
As noted by the Washington Post, Duncan's family is moving back to Chicago while Duncan says he's sticking out the rest of the Obama Presidency. While some have expressed skepticism, I can believe it. Summer is the time to move kids without messing up their world, and this summer is likely to be less messy than next. Why not. Of course, as widely noted, his kids will attend an elite non-Common Core unreformed private school. That would have been a good thing to mention.
But Kelleher turns to Peter Cunningham for quotes. Cunningham is a long-time Arne associate who now heads up the $12 million dollar website-that-will-not-be-named, but which now looks almost hard-hitting compared to Kelleher's piece. Cunningham says Duncan is no quitter, with grit and drive and stuff.
Duncan's sister confirms he's not looking for work right now. Probably true-- Duncan can line up consulting work in the ed industry with an hour's worth of phone calls, so why rush anything.
Considering what other education secretaries have done after their
terms, Cunningham doesn’t see Duncan returning to district leadership,
either. Consulting, elected office and work with think tanks and
foundations are more likely. While in CPS, Duncan’s team built
relationships with private foundations and federal grant administrators
that more than tripled the district’s take of competitive grant funds.
I'm not sure which thinky tank would have him, but I get a smile out of imagining him going off to work for Mike Petrilli at Fordham. The implication of that last sentence seems clear to me-- Duncan will be able to hook people up with some serious money.
So, not so much as a sentence to consider the reality, the controversy, or the legacy of Duncan's work in office. Between this and the Post profile, it's beginning to look like we're going to be subjected to a year or more of valedictory essays filled with attaboys but no consideration of the damage to public education done by Duncan.
Look, I have no desire to see the guy drawn and quartered and publicly pilloried, but he has presided over an unprecedented re-engineering of the entire purpose of US public education-- one of our oldest and most honored institutions-- and in the process has come close to destroying one of the legs on which democracy stands. Backlash against his work has created entire new movements that didn't exist a decade ago, and Congress has spent part of their time writing a new law arguing about just how much power should be stripped from his office simply in reaction to how he has used that power.
I don't need to see Duncan personally attacked, but any retrospective or faux retrospective has to look at where we are in education policy, what choices have been made, what the effects have been on us as a nation, if for no other reason than we need to have a serious talk about where to head next. A business as usual, nothing to see here, so how do you like living in DC puff piece is irresponsible.
Duncan's one gift is that he has such an aww-shucks lovable lunkhead air about him that people don't so much notice that he has been laying waste with a battleax. As he nears his exit from office, we cannot afford to pay attention only to the aw shucks and ignore the damage done with the battleax.
Monday, July 27, 2015
Sunday, July 26, 2015
Teacher "Shortage" Reflections
Assembling my recent post on teacher shortages gave me a lot to reflect on, but since the piece was already a gazillion words long, I saved that reflection for another post. Here is that post.
In no particular order, here are some of the things that jumped out as I did my national tour.
Spin Is a Thing
I deliberately searched through general press coverage. I didn't dig deep for True Facts, and I stayed away from direct reporting by teachers' unions. So what I found yesterday was a better reflection of what people are saying than what is necessarily true. I don't have to tell you those aren't always the same. Statements about shortages fell largely into these categories--
* OMGZ!! We have barely any teachers and we must must MUST certify anything that moves as a teacher right after we invite as many Teach for America folks we can find into the state.
* Look at that teacher shortage! It's proof that the people who run our state suck with a sucky suckiness that really sucks.
* We want to have good schools. We are paying attention to what's happening, and we're trying to make smart, responsible choices about how to handle things.
The third group seems to lack a certain sense of dramatic crisis mode in their press coverage. The other two, not so much (and I say that knowing that group two includes people who share many of my concerns and allegiances about education).
I suspect that this relates to how some of the results came in. Many people expressed amazement that Ohio is not talking about teacher shortages; that may be because charters really have increased demand or it may be because running for president is easier if you don't have one more education crisis at home. Likewise, folks let me know that many parts of California are wielding the layoff ax with verve, in a way that would belie any claims of shortage. If there's a disconnect between reality and reportage, that's a story, but it's not one that this citizen hack faux journalist had the time to run down, yet.
Teacher Diversity
Only two states were talking about it. Why this issue keeps falling off the front burner is beyond me. It's critical that our teaching force shift to reflect the new reality of diversity in our student population, but it's just not happening, and nobody in a position to make a fuss is doing much about it. In all the talk of recruitment and retention, nobody is talking about getting non-white, non-female teachers into classrooms and keeping them there-- and we should be talking about it a great deal.
Shortages Are Not All Bad
Teacher shortages aren't so bad if you're a teacher looking for work. And relatively mild ones can be a help.
Here in PA teacher training programs are drying up and shutting down because of low, low, low enrollment. That low enrollment is undoubtedly related to the fact that everybody knows a teacher who can't get a job, or who had a job that she lost when the district shut down a school because of financials pressures created by our genius leaders in Harrisburg. Should we turn a corner some day (hey, it could happen), we're going to go from teacher glut to teacher shortage very quickly, and once that happens, it takes years for college students to get the memo that, yes, there are teaching jobs again.
So a little bit of shortage equals an encouraging job market that helps draw people into the field (assuming, of course, that you haven't North Carolinaed everything up and made teaching hopelessly untenable as a career).
The Substitute Thing
I should have known. I mean, we're in substitute trouble here even though we ought to be loaded with teachers who want to get a job.
This is going to need its own piece, because it's not clear what it means. Some writers consider it a sign of teacher shortages. In my area, I consider it a sign of two things-- 1) that no human being not living in a van by the river could ever live on sub pay and 2) the former sub pool of nice housewifey ladies with teaching credentials who wanted to make a little grocery money on top of their husband's real salary-- that group is now living on Hippogryph Lane, just past the unicorn farm.
But it is clearly a national issue, with all sorts of implications, and none of them are good. I'll definitely get back to this.
The Real Shortage
It's not teachers-- it's working conditions conducive to maintaining the nation's teacher force. If we discovered that our armed forces were comprised of six skinny guys with slingshots, we'd want to know why recruiting was broken, and we'd try to fix it. We wouldn't try to punish the six guys for not being one hundred bulky man-mountains. We wouldn't try to make it harder to legitimately get into the armed forces while simultaneously picking up the slack by grabbing random people off the street. And we wouldn't try to change the job description of a soldier (Anybody who can make a mean face should do) so that we could fill up empty spots without paying any attention to what we were filling them with.
As I've said many times, it is mysterious that so many free market acolytes don't seem to get this. You offer what the market requires you to offer. Instead, many states are trying to bite the invisible hand that has ceased to feed them.
In no particular order, here are some of the things that jumped out as I did my national tour.
Spin Is a Thing
I deliberately searched through general press coverage. I didn't dig deep for True Facts, and I stayed away from direct reporting by teachers' unions. So what I found yesterday was a better reflection of what people are saying than what is necessarily true. I don't have to tell you those aren't always the same. Statements about shortages fell largely into these categories--
* OMGZ!! We have barely any teachers and we must must MUST certify anything that moves as a teacher right after we invite as many Teach for America folks we can find into the state.
* Look at that teacher shortage! It's proof that the people who run our state suck with a sucky suckiness that really sucks.
* We want to have good schools. We are paying attention to what's happening, and we're trying to make smart, responsible choices about how to handle things.
The third group seems to lack a certain sense of dramatic crisis mode in their press coverage. The other two, not so much (and I say that knowing that group two includes people who share many of my concerns and allegiances about education).
I suspect that this relates to how some of the results came in. Many people expressed amazement that Ohio is not talking about teacher shortages; that may be because charters really have increased demand or it may be because running for president is easier if you don't have one more education crisis at home. Likewise, folks let me know that many parts of California are wielding the layoff ax with verve, in a way that would belie any claims of shortage. If there's a disconnect between reality and reportage, that's a story, but it's not one that this citizen hack faux journalist had the time to run down, yet.
Teacher Diversity
Only two states were talking about it. Why this issue keeps falling off the front burner is beyond me. It's critical that our teaching force shift to reflect the new reality of diversity in our student population, but it's just not happening, and nobody in a position to make a fuss is doing much about it. In all the talk of recruitment and retention, nobody is talking about getting non-white, non-female teachers into classrooms and keeping them there-- and we should be talking about it a great deal.
Shortages Are Not All Bad
Teacher shortages aren't so bad if you're a teacher looking for work. And relatively mild ones can be a help.
Here in PA teacher training programs are drying up and shutting down because of low, low, low enrollment. That low enrollment is undoubtedly related to the fact that everybody knows a teacher who can't get a job, or who had a job that she lost when the district shut down a school because of financials pressures created by our genius leaders in Harrisburg. Should we turn a corner some day (hey, it could happen), we're going to go from teacher glut to teacher shortage very quickly, and once that happens, it takes years for college students to get the memo that, yes, there are teaching jobs again.
So a little bit of shortage equals an encouraging job market that helps draw people into the field (assuming, of course, that you haven't North Carolinaed everything up and made teaching hopelessly untenable as a career).
The Substitute Thing
I should have known. I mean, we're in substitute trouble here even though we ought to be loaded with teachers who want to get a job.
This is going to need its own piece, because it's not clear what it means. Some writers consider it a sign of teacher shortages. In my area, I consider it a sign of two things-- 1) that no human being not living in a van by the river could ever live on sub pay and 2) the former sub pool of nice housewifey ladies with teaching credentials who wanted to make a little grocery money on top of their husband's real salary-- that group is now living on Hippogryph Lane, just past the unicorn farm.
But it is clearly a national issue, with all sorts of implications, and none of them are good. I'll definitely get back to this.
The Real Shortage
It's not teachers-- it's working conditions conducive to maintaining the nation's teacher force. If we discovered that our armed forces were comprised of six skinny guys with slingshots, we'd want to know why recruiting was broken, and we'd try to fix it. We wouldn't try to punish the six guys for not being one hundred bulky man-mountains. We wouldn't try to make it harder to legitimately get into the armed forces while simultaneously picking up the slack by grabbing random people off the street. And we wouldn't try to change the job description of a soldier (Anybody who can make a mean face should do) so that we could fill up empty spots without paying any attention to what we were filling them with.
As I've said many times, it is mysterious that so many free market acolytes don't seem to get this. You offer what the market requires you to offer. Instead, many states are trying to bite the invisible hand that has ceased to feed them.
ICYMI: Top Edublogging of the Week (7/26)
As always, this is neither all-inclusive nor based on any criteria other than my own. But here are some things you should read from last week.
When candidates talk education, media rarely go beyond buzzwords
Well, in all fairness, the media don't do any better with other issues, but here's a great look at the side tracks that keep appearing in coverage of candidate edubloviation.
Dumbing down kids
If you want to get angry over EngageNY and canned teaching programs all over again, here's the piece. Detailed, specific, and incisive.
Who's actually running America's charter schools
You actually need a double dose of School Finance 101 this week. Start with this look at which groups are actually getting most of the charter business. Then move onto this explanation of just one of the crazy twists in charter financing. It's a little wonky, but clear and thorough.
ALEC now says school vouchers are for kids in suburbia
This one's important, and charts the shift in the voucher sales pitch. We knew this was coming-- now it's here. Vouchers are no longer pitched as a way to rescue those poor kids in failing urban schools. Now some folks would like to expand the market.
When candidates talk education, media rarely go beyond buzzwords
Well, in all fairness, the media don't do any better with other issues, but here's a great look at the side tracks that keep appearing in coverage of candidate edubloviation.
Dumbing down kids
If you want to get angry over EngageNY and canned teaching programs all over again, here's the piece. Detailed, specific, and incisive.
Who's actually running America's charter schools
You actually need a double dose of School Finance 101 this week. Start with this look at which groups are actually getting most of the charter business. Then move onto this explanation of just one of the crazy twists in charter financing. It's a little wonky, but clear and thorough.
ALEC now says school vouchers are for kids in suburbia
This one's important, and charts the shift in the voucher sales pitch. We knew this was coming-- now it's here. Vouchers are no longer pitched as a way to rescue those poor kids in failing urban schools. Now some folks would like to expand the market.
Teacher "Shortage" Coast to Coast
Talk of teacher shortages has been popping up on a state-to-state basis, so I thought I'd engage in a rare act of actual data collection. I'm working from two basic sources here: 1) a report from USED that actually goes back to 1991, but we'll just focus on the present and 2) my research assistant, Dr. Google, with which I'll check for "OMGZ! We haz got no teechurz!" stories for each state. Let's see how we're all doing, shall we?
ALABAMA
The USED shows Alabama hurting in many instructional areas, and they've been talking about a teacher staffing crisis almost a decade ago. They've recently blamed a substitute shortage on Obamacare, because reasons. Since the Great Teacher Crisis of 2007, they've been trying to offer incentives like bonuses for working in districts or subject areas that are suffering a shortage. Alabama is not known for its great teaching conditions or spending on education, but nobody is hollering about a teacher shortage at the moment.
ALASKA
One of the least shortagey states on the USED's list. Alaska has also been plagued by periodic bouts of teacher shortage, and that seems linked mostly to the general issue of enticing teachers to work in Extremely Rural Areas. Average salaries push $70K, but if you know Alaska, you know living there is not exactly cheap. However, there seems to be no major panic at the moment.
ARIZONA
USED says that Arizona is short everywhere in everything, and that's reflected in media reports throwing the word "crisis" around as recently as yesterday. Arizona is dead-last in per pupil spending and fighting to get to the bottom on teacher pay, but the charter operators rate them highly. Things are so bad that a study on recruitment and retention offered suggestions along the lines of "treat teachers with respect," which is apparently a new idea for the reform-hungry privateers who have been running the state. A new study on the shortage is expected next week; I don't figure it's going to say, "Yeah, everything's okay now."
ARKANSAS
Arkansas has had teacher recruitment problems long enough to have been growing some solutions of their own. Meet the Arkansas Teacher Corps (Motto: why pay Teach for America when you can just grow your own). Arkansas is a leading laboratory in ways to get anybody off the street and into a classroom. The state is also busy stripping districts of local control; perhaps that will help.
CALIFORNIA
Yeah, everyone is freaking out in sunny CA. Enrollment in teacher programs has been cut in half, and things are bad enough that even reformy outlets like EdSource are sounding the alarm (and calling for any warm available bodies to be slapped in classrooms). Not only that, but California's teaching force, while shrinking, is also turning more white even as the student population turns less white. California, ever the nation's leader, is leading with an impressive teacher shortage.
COLORADO
Colorado districts have tried a little, "Hey, it's the whole country" to blunt finger-pointing as they contemplate their shortages. And they are another state to report a shortage in substitutes, including districts like Jefferson County, a district also in the news for hoohaw over it's hostile takeover by outsider-backed reformsters.
CONNECTICUT
Connecticut has had shortages in the past, but in recent years they may have been one of the states to stay ahead of the shortage by simply cutting teaching jobs like crazy. CT also suffers from some selective shortages, like a lack of teachers qualified to keep up with their growing English Language Learner population. Their reformy governor favors just giving certificates to any warm body.
DELAWARE
Delaware has been feeling the pinch for a few years, and has a robustly advertised alternative certification path. Like many states, they have some specific areas that are extra-thin. Unlike many states, they do a regular study of How Things Are Going with recruitment and retention. The 2013 report indicated that shortages were a result of lack of qualified candidates in public school, and crappy low salaries in charter schools.
DC
You know what? They make such consistently terrible hiring choices, I'm not going to bother.
FLORIDA
Two years ago Florida was scrambling to deal with "critical shortages" in seven areas, including every core subject but history. Florida dug up a fun data point. The ACT asks seniors what career they want to pursue. 81% of FL seniors took the test; 3% of those said they planned to teach. Meanwhile, districts are sending administrators to New York State on recruitment junkets, and the University of Southern Florida is using grant money to give scholarships to future (they hope) science teachers.
GEORGIA
Georgia is in trouble. Next year they expect to hire 14,000 teachers, but Georgia colleges expect to graduate 3,500 ed majors. The state is talking about offering 10% bonuses for good teachers to stay at low-performing schools (this is both a bizarre perverse incentive and a Catch-22-- how does a teacher at a low-performing school maintain a high rating). Ha! Sorry, my mistake. That was Georgia's plan fifteen years ago!! How's that working? Well, Georgia, you will recall, is home to the Atlanta school system (motto: we'll send you to jail if you cheat and fire you if you don't). Georgia is also another state that stays ahead of the shortage by slashing job.
HAWAI'I
Surely not Hawai'i. It's beautiful and tropical and-- oops, ranked the fifth worst state for teachers. 41st in commute time! 46th in public school spending per pupil! And 51st in both starting and median salaries! Which is extra brutal because absolutely everything in Hawai'i is more expensive than it is anywhere else on the planet. The state also has its own extra set of issues that come with indigenous people in a state that left colony-like status behind less than two generations ago. Put it all together, and Hawai'i is a state that always has a teacher shortage.
IDAHO
This spring, 55 out of 65 Idaho districts said they could not fill all their positions with qualified teachers. In 2007-08, 1,184 teacher certificates were issues; in 2013-14, the number was 866. Idaho leaders have not so much treated this as a problem that needs to be solved as an opportunity to get their TFA on. But they did balance that by trying to make it harder to become an actual teacher. Doesn't seem to be helping, yet. Their USED "needs" list is huge.
ILLINOIS
Illinois has been dealing with teacher shortages off and on for at least fifteen years (says Dr. Google). They are another state noting the substitute shortage. Illinois only claims a shortage in certain subject areas, but some observers think there's a retention issue. Chicago leads the state with creative ways to beat teachers down, but it also leads in feisty unions that will fight back. But there are signs that the pipeline is drying up.
INDIANA
Indiana is wracked with concern over an oncoming teacher shortage. The state has been a reformster playground, rolling back teacher support and attacking teacher pensions, so some sources are reporting a jump in teacher retirement. But the supply end of the pipeline is even more damaged-- the state Department of Education reports a drop in issued teacher licenses from 7,500 in 2007-08 down to 934 in 2013-14. While trouble filling openings is still spotty, the future does not look good.
IOWA
Iowa has a well-promoted loan forgiveness program for areas designated by the state as shortage areas, taking care of up to 20% of a teacher's outstanding balance. You can also color me surprised that Iowa is one of few states to so clearly track where they're short (the usual suspects-- math, science, ELL). The Iowa Business Council backs much of this, but nobody seems to be suggesting that more TFA and charter schools would help.
KANSAS
Kansas is in big trouble. In 2014, the GOP used a 4 AM session to strip teachers of job protections. The state has slashed spending and capped per-pupil spending so that local districts have hands tied. And teacher pay is lousy. How bad is it? A Missouri district has recruitment billboards on Kansas. Right now Kansas is still looking at about 500 teacher openings, more than double the usual. And that includes elementary positions, which are not a shortage anywhere (except states that have made their teachers miserable ).
KENTUCKY
Kentucky has a rural teacher issue, and a special education teacher issue. They have some scholarship programs in place for teachers. USED find them short in the usual STEM areas.
LOUISIANA
New Orleans is arguably Patient Zero for the technique of driving teachers out so that you can declare a shortage and start shipping in boatloads of TFA-style temps. Retirement numbers in LA have been climbing for years while teacher program enrollment numbers decline and tales keep emerging of teachers being driven out. It's hard to know how much of a teacher shortage LA would have if the state hadn't been working to manufacture one.
MAINE
Other than suffering under a loony-tunes eternally pissed off governor, Maine does not appear to be feeling any special pinch.
MARYLAND
In 2013, Calvert Institute studied Maryland's consistent teacher shortage issues and determined that their certification process was too burdensome, and the state should go heavier on alternative certification. The state has been combating large teacher shortages for quite a while, to little apparent effect, but they've cranked up alt programs and TFA presence. It could be that people just don't like Maryland, or it could be that Baltimore is one of the worst places to work in the world.
MASSACHUSETTS
Fifteen years ago, when the last big teacher shortage hit, Massachusetts offered $20,000 signing bonuses. Since then, they've decided that Teach for America might be cheaper.
MICHIGAN
Numbers for teacher prep programs were down 38% as of 2013. In 2014 the state superintendent was pushing for any alternative to trying to improve that pipeline. At the same time they've tried to open alternative doors to any warm bodies, Michigan has made the traditional pathway tougher. Gee, I wonder how that will work out.
MINNESOTA
Minnesota has it all. They are short on subs. Their rural areas have trouble recruiting. And the state as a whole has a shortage. The administration argues that's a good reason to loosen up requirements, which seems to include tying VAM to layoffs (despite the fact that Minnesota has been doing little laying off). Meanwhile, the "community expert" program lets anyone with a job become a teacher.
MISSISSIPPI
The USED shows Mississippi with one of the historically lowest levels of teacher shortages. That seems...unlikely. The state lists 48 school districts with critical shortages that qualify for state assistance. There was a lot of fuss about the teacher shortage in 2013, but that seems to have been aimed at installing an extremely loose alternative certification path.
MISSOURI
We last saw Missouri trying to poach teachers from Kansas. Missouri is another of the few states that has been studying and addressing the teacher shortage at the state level. The report they generate is a pretty data-rich piece of work, including data on first year hires, attrition, and non-white teachers. Attrition has been high, but consistent. Ditto hiring rate. Missouri's shortage is acute enough that at least one group has sprung up to make a living recruiting non-teachers to teach. Missouri voters rejected an effort to strip tenure, but legislators have just kept trying to get rid of it anyway. Because when you don't have enough teachers, being able to fire the ones you have is important.
MONTANA
Last summer, Montana was looking at over 1,000 vacancies, with particularly bad shortages at the seven reservations. Montana has the rural problem plus the lousy pay problem. Can you support a family for less than $30K a year, particularly in an area where your spouse may not be able to find work? Many teachers say, "No, thank you."
NEBRASKA
One more state with the substitute and rural problems. Nebraska schools are short in many areas by their own count, and the state has instituted the Attracting Excellence to Teaching program to make becoming a teacher more affordable. Some outfits, like the Platte Institute, have advocated for alternative certificates and an end to tenure, but without success. Nobody is calling teacher supply a crisis in Nebraska.
NEVADA
Clark County (which includes Las Vegas) is the fifth largest district in the country. If they hired all 1,300 expected teacher grads this year, they would still be about 1,300 teacher short. Even programs to fast-track former cocktail waitresses into the classroom can't keep up. The USED list is huge. And Las Vegas is another of those places where a teacher salary can barely-if-at-all provide enough support to live there. Meanwhile, Nevada has launched a lamebrained vouchers-for-all program; proponents say the program will lead to many more fine schools opening, but how exactly do you build more capacity when you can't staff the capacity that you have? When it comes to dealing with teacher shortages by using reformy foolishness, Nevada is a state to watch.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
New Hampshire talks about a "critical" shortage in STEM teachers, and the USED list is long for such a tiny state. The Granite State offers a wide variety of alternative paths, including one for anyone with a Bachelors degree who can get a school to hire and train her.
NEW JERSEY
New Jersey has been struggling to fill math and science positions for a few years. Well in the grip of reformsteritis, they have also pursued making it harder to enter teaching through traditional paths, even as the many state-operated districts roll out the red carpet for Teach for America. Meanwhile, the USED list shows shortages all across the state.
NEW MEXICO
In 2013, district across the state were short new teachers and losing old ones. In the fall of 2014, Albuquerque schools were still 200 teachers short. By 2015, the state and business were teaming up to float such ideas as a fast-track program to certify STEM teachers. The legislature has studied the problem and determined that NM should pay more and hire better.
NEW YORK
New York is one of those states that has made entry to the teaching profession a costly, difficult nightmare, but then once you're teaching, you can face Cuomo's new monstrosity of a teacher eval system. Despite all that, New York state is not talking about any teacher supply crisis.
NORTH CAROLINA
Oh. North Carolina. Has any state worked so hard over the past few years to destroy teaching as a sustainable career? Stagnant wages, destroyed job protections, and low spending on schools. It's no surprise that the state expects to need over 10,000 teachers, but only has 4,300 in the pipeline. Radicals have suggested that actually raising teacher pay might make the field more attract, but you know that's just crazy talk.
NORTH DAKOTA
North Dakota is in trouble and concerned enough to launch a Recruitment and Retention Task Force. ND has known they were in trouble for a few years, and has climbed up from 49th to 36th in national average salary rankings, but Minnesota still kicks their butt. The state also has the rural problem, with isolated districts near the Canadian border getting zero applications for some jobs. It's not going to get better; projections call for about a third of the 10,000 person teaching force to retire over the next ten years, but ed schools are producing fewer than 400 new licensees a year. They have a loan forgiveness program, but their alternative certificate path does not open the door to just anybody.
OHIO
Ohio's DOE still instructs districts to handle hiring as if they were awash in a sea of high quality applicants, and news articles talk about how the market is good for job-seeking teachers, but few complaints are out there about a shortage. There may be a retirement bump coming because of upcoming pension changes, but for the time being, Ohio is the happy land of No Teacher Shortage.
OKLAHOMA
OK is feeling the shortage, hard. The state is looking for 1,000 teachers, with a ton of veterans retiring-- this as the end of a year in which many positions never were filled. In two years, emergency certification has risen from 97 to 499. OK teachers start at about $31,600, one of the lowest salaries in the country-- and OK teachers haven't had a raise in eight years. The state has moved to offer bonuses for retention or recruitment, as well as making it easier for out-of-state certification to be used in OK.
OREGON
Facing a shortage of certified teachers. Oregon does not do the alternative certificate route; instead, they will essentially let you start teaching before you've completely finished your teacher training program.
PENNSYLVANIA
We have avoided a teacher shortage pretty simply. By deploying crushing financial pressures on districts, we have been cutting 4,000 to 5,000 jobs a year. We have crowded classrooms, and the worst rich vs. poor funding gap in the country. But no teacher shortage. Nosirree.
RHODE ISLAND
Well, if there's a Rhode Island teacher shortage, nobody is talking about it on line. Even so, the USED lists RI as short in most areas, including elementary ed, which is rare indeed.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Many years ago, I distance-dated a teacher in SC who went to work for the state's recruitment program, a forward-thinking program that started getting students interested in teaching while they were still in high school. But today, shortages in rural and urban schools remain a problem. The state is bringing in alternative certificate pros to help. But although they beat out North Carolina, South Carolina still landed 45th on the list of worst states for teachers.
SOUTH DAKOTA
Last year, 31 districts in South Dakota started the year with unfilled positions. The teacher shortage was discussed in tones of deep concern last summer in the capitol. But folks can spot the most notable issue-- South Dakota is 51st in the nation for teacher pay. Fixing that would require some sort of tax, and that seems to be a conversation-killer. Or you could, as the state does, let the schools hire warm body as long as that body embarks on a path to get credentials. In the meantime, SD schools feature a mix of unqualified teachers and empty positions.
TENNESSEE
What about the home of reformster miracles? They have the substitute problem, but it turns out they have a governor who's at least willing to pay lip service to keeping teacher pay competitive. Of course, they also have an Achievement School District, a mechanism for turning public schools into revenue-generating charters. TN has many education issues, but nobody is hollering about a teacher shortage just yet.
TEXAS
Texas has two parts of the teacher shortage problem-- hard to find enough applicants, and a tremendous turnover rate among those they hire. But it has only been a year since legislators noticed that maybe this is a subject in need of discussion. Texas also has a program that puts alternative certificatees straight into the classroom, which means those who realize they've made a mistake can walk straight out again. So Texas is short-handed and without a real plan.
UTAH
Another state short on subs. Utah is short on the usual big three -- math, science, special ed-- and was willing to consider the unusual step of paying more for those fields. Legislators have also discussed Vergarafying the state and making it harder for teachers to achieve job security; unsurprisingly, some folks suggested that such a move would make it even harder to recruit teachers.
VERMONT
Vermont publishes an annual list of shortage areas. Surprisingly, the list currently shows a need for math and English, but not science. Nobody is complaining about a big teacher shortage.
VIRGINIA
Virginia lists most of the usual areas as having shortages, but there are no articles talking about any teacher shortage crisis.
WASHINGTON
Washington could face a teacher crunch for unusual reasons-- the voters asked for reduced class sizes for K-12 and full-day kindergarten. That would depend on fully funding the school system, which is, as always, a problem-- fully funding right-sized classes beyond that K-3 has been denied by the legislature. And the sub pool has been shrinking for years. Washington teachers have also gone without a cost-of-living increase since 2008. So a shortage could be on the way, for any of several reasons.
WEST VIRGINIA
West Virginia has just passed a law to fix their teacher shortage-- more TFA and alternative certificates. WV has reportedly 700 unfilled teaching spots, with the largest number of teachers working outside their area. The legislator leading this initiative is just one more arguing that the best way to fill spots that might go to unqualified teachers is by hiring more unqualified teachers, because, reasons. Meanwhile, in one rural area, a guy teaches biology because (and I am not making this up) because his wife's a nurse.
WISCONSIN
Gee, why wouldn't an 18-year-old who has spent high school watching teachers get vilified and beaten down and stripped of job protections and union powers and pay-- why wouldn't that young person want to go into teaching? Well, apparently she doesn't. Scott Walker is deeply committed to sweeping away public schools and replacing them with low-cost, high-profit charters, so teachers got to go. Here's a handy list of Wisconsin teaching highlights. Wisconsin is the best example of one other way the teacher shortage plays out-- you can't have a teacher shortage if your ideal number of trained, professional teachers is zero.
WYOMING
Wyoming put The Teacher Shortage Loan Repayment Program in place for teachers who would stay in Wyoming after graduation; they did it a decade ago. The teacher pay is good, taxes are nearly non-existent, and if you like the kind of pretty that Wyoming has, nobody does it better. Since their neighbors are states like South Dakota, they are well-positioned to recruit, though they do have some select shortage in some certification areas. (Also, I left them out of the first published version of this piece. Sorry about that, Wyoming)
WHAT DID WE LEARN?
I did learn some new odds and ends. I had not realized the extent of the substitute shortage. I also didn't realize that agricultural teaching was in trouble because of shortages of qualified teachers in that field.
Teacher programs really are slowing down, though ideas about how to address that are... well, spread over a wide area. The Center for American Progress thinks we should make teacher school harder and put more obstacles in the way because that will make more students enroll? Surprisingly few commentators point out the obvious-- that teaching has been beaten down for a generation.
Not all shortages are created equal. The big three are math, science and special ed, but elementary teachers are being produced in more-than-sufficient numbers.
But mostly we need a new word, because we're not really talking about a shortage of teachers-- we're talking about a lack of incentives and an excess of disincentives to go into teaching. Put another way-- there is no state among the fifty that is paying top dollar, providing great working conditions, and treating its teachers like professionals that is struggling with a teacher shortage. Instead, states offer low pay, poor work conditions, no job security, no autonomy, and no power over your own workplace and voila!!-- teacher "shortage."
And in the interests of space, I didn't even get into Right To Work states where teachers can't bargain and just have to trust the tender mercies of the state.
Look, even convenience stores get it. When my local place can't get good people to work for minimum wage, they offer more than minimum wage. States who set a standard of Barely Better Than North Carolina or South Dakota will always have a "shortage."
And yes-- many of these states aren't manufacturing a shortage so much as they're trying to engineer a new definition of what a teacher is. "Look! If we define 'teacher' as a sentient adult willing to stand in a classroom, there's no shortage at all!!"
Still, whatever we call it, something is going on across almost all fifty states, not just the few that have made big news with their particular staffing issues. Some states have adopted a direct, thoughtful approach to the issues. Most have not. That's the picture coast to coast. Incidentally-- if you know something I missed in your state, don't hesitate to shoot me a note or speak up in the comments.
And because this is already too long, you can find my further thoughts here.
ALABAMA
The USED shows Alabama hurting in many instructional areas, and they've been talking about a teacher staffing crisis almost a decade ago. They've recently blamed a substitute shortage on Obamacare, because reasons. Since the Great Teacher Crisis of 2007, they've been trying to offer incentives like bonuses for working in districts or subject areas that are suffering a shortage. Alabama is not known for its great teaching conditions or spending on education, but nobody is hollering about a teacher shortage at the moment.
ALASKA
One of the least shortagey states on the USED's list. Alaska has also been plagued by periodic bouts of teacher shortage, and that seems linked mostly to the general issue of enticing teachers to work in Extremely Rural Areas. Average salaries push $70K, but if you know Alaska, you know living there is not exactly cheap. However, there seems to be no major panic at the moment.
ARIZONA
USED says that Arizona is short everywhere in everything, and that's reflected in media reports throwing the word "crisis" around as recently as yesterday. Arizona is dead-last in per pupil spending and fighting to get to the bottom on teacher pay, but the charter operators rate them highly. Things are so bad that a study on recruitment and retention offered suggestions along the lines of "treat teachers with respect," which is apparently a new idea for the reform-hungry privateers who have been running the state. A new study on the shortage is expected next week; I don't figure it's going to say, "Yeah, everything's okay now."
ARKANSAS
Arkansas has had teacher recruitment problems long enough to have been growing some solutions of their own. Meet the Arkansas Teacher Corps (Motto: why pay Teach for America when you can just grow your own). Arkansas is a leading laboratory in ways to get anybody off the street and into a classroom. The state is also busy stripping districts of local control; perhaps that will help.
CALIFORNIA
Yeah, everyone is freaking out in sunny CA. Enrollment in teacher programs has been cut in half, and things are bad enough that even reformy outlets like EdSource are sounding the alarm (and calling for any warm available bodies to be slapped in classrooms). Not only that, but California's teaching force, while shrinking, is also turning more white even as the student population turns less white. California, ever the nation's leader, is leading with an impressive teacher shortage.
COLORADO
Colorado districts have tried a little, "Hey, it's the whole country" to blunt finger-pointing as they contemplate their shortages. And they are another state to report a shortage in substitutes, including districts like Jefferson County, a district also in the news for hoohaw over it's hostile takeover by outsider-backed reformsters.
CONNECTICUT
Connecticut has had shortages in the past, but in recent years they may have been one of the states to stay ahead of the shortage by simply cutting teaching jobs like crazy. CT also suffers from some selective shortages, like a lack of teachers qualified to keep up with their growing English Language Learner population. Their reformy governor favors just giving certificates to any warm body.
DELAWARE
Delaware has been feeling the pinch for a few years, and has a robustly advertised alternative certification path. Like many states, they have some specific areas that are extra-thin. Unlike many states, they do a regular study of How Things Are Going with recruitment and retention. The 2013 report indicated that shortages were a result of lack of qualified candidates in public school, and crappy low salaries in charter schools.
DC
You know what? They make such consistently terrible hiring choices, I'm not going to bother.
FLORIDA
Two years ago Florida was scrambling to deal with "critical shortages" in seven areas, including every core subject but history. Florida dug up a fun data point. The ACT asks seniors what career they want to pursue. 81% of FL seniors took the test; 3% of those said they planned to teach. Meanwhile, districts are sending administrators to New York State on recruitment junkets, and the University of Southern Florida is using grant money to give scholarships to future (they hope) science teachers.
GEORGIA
Georgia is in trouble. Next year they expect to hire 14,000 teachers, but Georgia colleges expect to graduate 3,500 ed majors. The state is talking about offering 10% bonuses for good teachers to stay at low-performing schools (this is both a bizarre perverse incentive and a Catch-22-- how does a teacher at a low-performing school maintain a high rating). Ha! Sorry, my mistake. That was Georgia's plan fifteen years ago!! How's that working? Well, Georgia, you will recall, is home to the Atlanta school system (motto: we'll send you to jail if you cheat and fire you if you don't). Georgia is also another state that stays ahead of the shortage by slashing job.
HAWAI'I
Surely not Hawai'i. It's beautiful and tropical and-- oops, ranked the fifth worst state for teachers. 41st in commute time! 46th in public school spending per pupil! And 51st in both starting and median salaries! Which is extra brutal because absolutely everything in Hawai'i is more expensive than it is anywhere else on the planet. The state also has its own extra set of issues that come with indigenous people in a state that left colony-like status behind less than two generations ago. Put it all together, and Hawai'i is a state that always has a teacher shortage.
IDAHO
This spring, 55 out of 65 Idaho districts said they could not fill all their positions with qualified teachers. In 2007-08, 1,184 teacher certificates were issues; in 2013-14, the number was 866. Idaho leaders have not so much treated this as a problem that needs to be solved as an opportunity to get their TFA on. But they did balance that by trying to make it harder to become an actual teacher. Doesn't seem to be helping, yet. Their USED "needs" list is huge.
ILLINOIS
Illinois has been dealing with teacher shortages off and on for at least fifteen years (says Dr. Google). They are another state noting the substitute shortage. Illinois only claims a shortage in certain subject areas, but some observers think there's a retention issue. Chicago leads the state with creative ways to beat teachers down, but it also leads in feisty unions that will fight back. But there are signs that the pipeline is drying up.
INDIANA
Indiana is wracked with concern over an oncoming teacher shortage. The state has been a reformster playground, rolling back teacher support and attacking teacher pensions, so some sources are reporting a jump in teacher retirement. But the supply end of the pipeline is even more damaged-- the state Department of Education reports a drop in issued teacher licenses from 7,500 in 2007-08 down to 934 in 2013-14. While trouble filling openings is still spotty, the future does not look good.
IOWA
Iowa has a well-promoted loan forgiveness program for areas designated by the state as shortage areas, taking care of up to 20% of a teacher's outstanding balance. You can also color me surprised that Iowa is one of few states to so clearly track where they're short (the usual suspects-- math, science, ELL). The Iowa Business Council backs much of this, but nobody seems to be suggesting that more TFA and charter schools would help.
KANSAS
Kansas is in big trouble. In 2014, the GOP used a 4 AM session to strip teachers of job protections. The state has slashed spending and capped per-pupil spending so that local districts have hands tied. And teacher pay is lousy. How bad is it? A Missouri district has recruitment billboards on Kansas. Right now Kansas is still looking at about 500 teacher openings, more than double the usual. And that includes elementary positions, which are not a shortage anywhere (except states that have made their teachers miserable ).
KENTUCKY
Kentucky has a rural teacher issue, and a special education teacher issue. They have some scholarship programs in place for teachers. USED find them short in the usual STEM areas.
LOUISIANA
New Orleans is arguably Patient Zero for the technique of driving teachers out so that you can declare a shortage and start shipping in boatloads of TFA-style temps. Retirement numbers in LA have been climbing for years while teacher program enrollment numbers decline and tales keep emerging of teachers being driven out. It's hard to know how much of a teacher shortage LA would have if the state hadn't been working to manufacture one.
MAINE
Other than suffering under a loony-tunes eternally pissed off governor, Maine does not appear to be feeling any special pinch.
MARYLAND
In 2013, Calvert Institute studied Maryland's consistent teacher shortage issues and determined that their certification process was too burdensome, and the state should go heavier on alternative certification. The state has been combating large teacher shortages for quite a while, to little apparent effect, but they've cranked up alt programs and TFA presence. It could be that people just don't like Maryland, or it could be that Baltimore is one of the worst places to work in the world.
MASSACHUSETTS
Fifteen years ago, when the last big teacher shortage hit, Massachusetts offered $20,000 signing bonuses. Since then, they've decided that Teach for America might be cheaper.
MICHIGAN
Numbers for teacher prep programs were down 38% as of 2013. In 2014 the state superintendent was pushing for any alternative to trying to improve that pipeline. At the same time they've tried to open alternative doors to any warm bodies, Michigan has made the traditional pathway tougher. Gee, I wonder how that will work out.
MINNESOTA
Minnesota has it all. They are short on subs. Their rural areas have trouble recruiting. And the state as a whole has a shortage. The administration argues that's a good reason to loosen up requirements, which seems to include tying VAM to layoffs (despite the fact that Minnesota has been doing little laying off). Meanwhile, the "community expert" program lets anyone with a job become a teacher.
MISSISSIPPI
The USED shows Mississippi with one of the historically lowest levels of teacher shortages. That seems...unlikely. The state lists 48 school districts with critical shortages that qualify for state assistance. There was a lot of fuss about the teacher shortage in 2013, but that seems to have been aimed at installing an extremely loose alternative certification path.
MISSOURI
We last saw Missouri trying to poach teachers from Kansas. Missouri is another of the few states that has been studying and addressing the teacher shortage at the state level. The report they generate is a pretty data-rich piece of work, including data on first year hires, attrition, and non-white teachers. Attrition has been high, but consistent. Ditto hiring rate. Missouri's shortage is acute enough that at least one group has sprung up to make a living recruiting non-teachers to teach. Missouri voters rejected an effort to strip tenure, but legislators have just kept trying to get rid of it anyway. Because when you don't have enough teachers, being able to fire the ones you have is important.
MONTANA
Last summer, Montana was looking at over 1,000 vacancies, with particularly bad shortages at the seven reservations. Montana has the rural problem plus the lousy pay problem. Can you support a family for less than $30K a year, particularly in an area where your spouse may not be able to find work? Many teachers say, "No, thank you."
NEBRASKA
One more state with the substitute and rural problems. Nebraska schools are short in many areas by their own count, and the state has instituted the Attracting Excellence to Teaching program to make becoming a teacher more affordable. Some outfits, like the Platte Institute, have advocated for alternative certificates and an end to tenure, but without success. Nobody is calling teacher supply a crisis in Nebraska.
NEVADA
Clark County (which includes Las Vegas) is the fifth largest district in the country. If they hired all 1,300 expected teacher grads this year, they would still be about 1,300 teacher short. Even programs to fast-track former cocktail waitresses into the classroom can't keep up. The USED list is huge. And Las Vegas is another of those places where a teacher salary can barely-if-at-all provide enough support to live there. Meanwhile, Nevada has launched a lamebrained vouchers-for-all program; proponents say the program will lead to many more fine schools opening, but how exactly do you build more capacity when you can't staff the capacity that you have? When it comes to dealing with teacher shortages by using reformy foolishness, Nevada is a state to watch.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
New Hampshire talks about a "critical" shortage in STEM teachers, and the USED list is long for such a tiny state. The Granite State offers a wide variety of alternative paths, including one for anyone with a Bachelors degree who can get a school to hire and train her.
NEW JERSEY
New Jersey has been struggling to fill math and science positions for a few years. Well in the grip of reformsteritis, they have also pursued making it harder to enter teaching through traditional paths, even as the many state-operated districts roll out the red carpet for Teach for America. Meanwhile, the USED list shows shortages all across the state.
NEW MEXICO
In 2013, district across the state were short new teachers and losing old ones. In the fall of 2014, Albuquerque schools were still 200 teachers short. By 2015, the state and business were teaming up to float such ideas as a fast-track program to certify STEM teachers. The legislature has studied the problem and determined that NM should pay more and hire better.
NEW YORK
New York is one of those states that has made entry to the teaching profession a costly, difficult nightmare, but then once you're teaching, you can face Cuomo's new monstrosity of a teacher eval system. Despite all that, New York state is not talking about any teacher supply crisis.
NORTH CAROLINA
Oh. North Carolina. Has any state worked so hard over the past few years to destroy teaching as a sustainable career? Stagnant wages, destroyed job protections, and low spending on schools. It's no surprise that the state expects to need over 10,000 teachers, but only has 4,300 in the pipeline. Radicals have suggested that actually raising teacher pay might make the field more attract, but you know that's just crazy talk.
NORTH DAKOTA
North Dakota is in trouble and concerned enough to launch a Recruitment and Retention Task Force. ND has known they were in trouble for a few years, and has climbed up from 49th to 36th in national average salary rankings, but Minnesota still kicks their butt. The state also has the rural problem, with isolated districts near the Canadian border getting zero applications for some jobs. It's not going to get better; projections call for about a third of the 10,000 person teaching force to retire over the next ten years, but ed schools are producing fewer than 400 new licensees a year. They have a loan forgiveness program, but their alternative certificate path does not open the door to just anybody.
OHIO
Ohio's DOE still instructs districts to handle hiring as if they were awash in a sea of high quality applicants, and news articles talk about how the market is good for job-seeking teachers, but few complaints are out there about a shortage. There may be a retirement bump coming because of upcoming pension changes, but for the time being, Ohio is the happy land of No Teacher Shortage.
OKLAHOMA
OK is feeling the shortage, hard. The state is looking for 1,000 teachers, with a ton of veterans retiring-- this as the end of a year in which many positions never were filled. In two years, emergency certification has risen from 97 to 499. OK teachers start at about $31,600, one of the lowest salaries in the country-- and OK teachers haven't had a raise in eight years. The state has moved to offer bonuses for retention or recruitment, as well as making it easier for out-of-state certification to be used in OK.
OREGON
Facing a shortage of certified teachers. Oregon does not do the alternative certificate route; instead, they will essentially let you start teaching before you've completely finished your teacher training program.
PENNSYLVANIA
We have avoided a teacher shortage pretty simply. By deploying crushing financial pressures on districts, we have been cutting 4,000 to 5,000 jobs a year. We have crowded classrooms, and the worst rich vs. poor funding gap in the country. But no teacher shortage. Nosirree.
RHODE ISLAND
Well, if there's a Rhode Island teacher shortage, nobody is talking about it on line. Even so, the USED lists RI as short in most areas, including elementary ed, which is rare indeed.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Many years ago, I distance-dated a teacher in SC who went to work for the state's recruitment program, a forward-thinking program that started getting students interested in teaching while they were still in high school. But today, shortages in rural and urban schools remain a problem. The state is bringing in alternative certificate pros to help. But although they beat out North Carolina, South Carolina still landed 45th on the list of worst states for teachers.
SOUTH DAKOTA
Last year, 31 districts in South Dakota started the year with unfilled positions. The teacher shortage was discussed in tones of deep concern last summer in the capitol. But folks can spot the most notable issue-- South Dakota is 51st in the nation for teacher pay. Fixing that would require some sort of tax, and that seems to be a conversation-killer. Or you could, as the state does, let the schools hire warm body as long as that body embarks on a path to get credentials. In the meantime, SD schools feature a mix of unqualified teachers and empty positions.
TENNESSEE
What about the home of reformster miracles? They have the substitute problem, but it turns out they have a governor who's at least willing to pay lip service to keeping teacher pay competitive. Of course, they also have an Achievement School District, a mechanism for turning public schools into revenue-generating charters. TN has many education issues, but nobody is hollering about a teacher shortage just yet.
TEXAS
Texas has two parts of the teacher shortage problem-- hard to find enough applicants, and a tremendous turnover rate among those they hire. But it has only been a year since legislators noticed that maybe this is a subject in need of discussion. Texas also has a program that puts alternative certificatees straight into the classroom, which means those who realize they've made a mistake can walk straight out again. So Texas is short-handed and without a real plan.
UTAH
Another state short on subs. Utah is short on the usual big three -- math, science, special ed-- and was willing to consider the unusual step of paying more for those fields. Legislators have also discussed Vergarafying the state and making it harder for teachers to achieve job security; unsurprisingly, some folks suggested that such a move would make it even harder to recruit teachers.
VERMONT
Vermont publishes an annual list of shortage areas. Surprisingly, the list currently shows a need for math and English, but not science. Nobody is complaining about a big teacher shortage.
VIRGINIA
Virginia lists most of the usual areas as having shortages, but there are no articles talking about any teacher shortage crisis.
WASHINGTON
Washington could face a teacher crunch for unusual reasons-- the voters asked for reduced class sizes for K-12 and full-day kindergarten. That would depend on fully funding the school system, which is, as always, a problem-- fully funding right-sized classes beyond that K-3 has been denied by the legislature. And the sub pool has been shrinking for years. Washington teachers have also gone without a cost-of-living increase since 2008. So a shortage could be on the way, for any of several reasons.
WEST VIRGINIA
West Virginia has just passed a law to fix their teacher shortage-- more TFA and alternative certificates. WV has reportedly 700 unfilled teaching spots, with the largest number of teachers working outside their area. The legislator leading this initiative is just one more arguing that the best way to fill spots that might go to unqualified teachers is by hiring more unqualified teachers, because, reasons. Meanwhile, in one rural area, a guy teaches biology because (and I am not making this up) because his wife's a nurse.
WISCONSIN
Gee, why wouldn't an 18-year-old who has spent high school watching teachers get vilified and beaten down and stripped of job protections and union powers and pay-- why wouldn't that young person want to go into teaching? Well, apparently she doesn't. Scott Walker is deeply committed to sweeping away public schools and replacing them with low-cost, high-profit charters, so teachers got to go. Here's a handy list of Wisconsin teaching highlights. Wisconsin is the best example of one other way the teacher shortage plays out-- you can't have a teacher shortage if your ideal number of trained, professional teachers is zero.
WYOMING
Wyoming put The Teacher Shortage Loan Repayment Program in place for teachers who would stay in Wyoming after graduation; they did it a decade ago. The teacher pay is good, taxes are nearly non-existent, and if you like the kind of pretty that Wyoming has, nobody does it better. Since their neighbors are states like South Dakota, they are well-positioned to recruit, though they do have some select shortage in some certification areas. (Also, I left them out of the first published version of this piece. Sorry about that, Wyoming)
WHAT DID WE LEARN?
I did learn some new odds and ends. I had not realized the extent of the substitute shortage. I also didn't realize that agricultural teaching was in trouble because of shortages of qualified teachers in that field.
Teacher programs really are slowing down, though ideas about how to address that are... well, spread over a wide area. The Center for American Progress thinks we should make teacher school harder and put more obstacles in the way because that will make more students enroll? Surprisingly few commentators point out the obvious-- that teaching has been beaten down for a generation.
Not all shortages are created equal. The big three are math, science and special ed, but elementary teachers are being produced in more-than-sufficient numbers.
But mostly we need a new word, because we're not really talking about a shortage of teachers-- we're talking about a lack of incentives and an excess of disincentives to go into teaching. Put another way-- there is no state among the fifty that is paying top dollar, providing great working conditions, and treating its teachers like professionals that is struggling with a teacher shortage. Instead, states offer low pay, poor work conditions, no job security, no autonomy, and no power over your own workplace and voila!!-- teacher "shortage."
And in the interests of space, I didn't even get into Right To Work states where teachers can't bargain and just have to trust the tender mercies of the state.
Look, even convenience stores get it. When my local place can't get good people to work for minimum wage, they offer more than minimum wage. States who set a standard of Barely Better Than North Carolina or South Dakota will always have a "shortage."
And yes-- many of these states aren't manufacturing a shortage so much as they're trying to engineer a new definition of what a teacher is. "Look! If we define 'teacher' as a sentient adult willing to stand in a classroom, there's no shortage at all!!"
Still, whatever we call it, something is going on across almost all fifty states, not just the few that have made big news with their particular staffing issues. Some states have adopted a direct, thoughtful approach to the issues. Most have not. That's the picture coast to coast. Incidentally-- if you know something I missed in your state, don't hesitate to shoot me a note or speak up in the comments.
And because this is already too long, you can find my further thoughts here.
Saturday, July 25, 2015
PA: Legislator Misunderstands School Costs
Not just any legislator. Today we're talking about Mike Folmer. Folmer is the Vice-chair of the Education Committee, a businessman (seems to mostly have worked in sales) who was first elected in 2006, one of the many "reform" candidates swept in after Pennsylvanians snapped under the final straw of the legislatures infamous late night Give Themselves A Raise shenanigans (an event infamous enough to get its own wikipedia page).
Folmer had a bout with non-Hodgkins lymphoma a few years back (not as scary as some of the big-name cancers, but damn, it does suck), which may or may not have something to do with his passionate support for legalizing marijuana (it's "part of God's creation he has given us.") Beyond that, he has been a reliably conservative lawmaker; just a couple of years ago, he had a hand in the plan to empower universities to disempower local voters and taxpayers by chartering schools. Folmer loves him some choice. Yup. Vice-Chair of the Education Committee.
So here comes Folmer with a piece that ran first on his own web page and then was picked up by the Patriot News site. It's worth a look to understand some of the misconceptions running around the state capital.
Folmer opens with a bunch of numbers, but his basic point is "OMGZ!! We are spend so many of the moneys on schools! Soooo much!!!!!" He is particularly concerned that, as much as we spend, now Governor Tom Wolf wants to spend more.
Folmer cites (as he often does) the line from the state constitution about education: “The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education to serve the needs of the Commonwealth.” And the he arrives at his point:
The current system is far from efficient: for each dollar invested in education, just 37 cents goes into classrooms. Most of the money -- 62 percent -- goes to the salaries, healthcare, continuing education, pensions, and other benefits of the adults in education. How many of us would support a charity where just 38 percent of the monies collected go to the purpose of the charity while 62 percent goes for overhead?
I've run into this misunderstanding before with people from the business world. I once listened to one of my own board members, who owned a concrete business, express absolute astonishment that such a high percentage of the school budget was personnel costs.
Folmer and others like him are failing to understand how costs break down in a sector that provides a service. Schools don't make anything; they don't spend big money on raw materials, or marketing, or equipment to turn the raw material into a finished product.
Folmer's contention that just 37 cents goes into the classroom is just wrong. The "adults in education" also go into the classroom. Every cent spent on a teacher goes straight into a classroom.
A school is not a charity, and teachers are not "overhead." A school provides a valuable service, and teachers are the people who actually do the work. A sports team that wants to be successful-- either in terms or winning or in drawing fans and making money (all of which are, of course, linked)-- does not try to build success by cutting its personnel costs to the bone. The Yankees do not list A-Rod as an overhead cost.
After bemoaning how people react poorly to him when he cites his "facts," Folmer wraps up with this:
To me, education should focus first – and always – on students. However, in the current debate over education funding, students are used mostly to demand more and more money – because: "it's for the kids."
As vice-chair of the education committee, Folmer is surely aware that Pennsylvania has the worst spending gap between rich and poor schools in the nation. Well, maybe he's aware of it. Folmer is the former head of the ed committee, and he wrote about what he learned in that position. He is disappointed in the teachers unions, and he likes to talk to bright, sparkly students. He knows that the PA pension is a mess, and he expects that people will want to spend more money on schools. And to fix all this....well, nothing. But to address the funding gap will, in fact, require a bunch of money; if he doesn't think so, Folmer needs to explain what other solution would address the issue. If he thinks PA should embrace its spot at the bottom of the heap proudly, then he needs to go ahead and make his case for that.
Finding the political will to deal with PA's education problems is going to be hard. Right now we're stuck in our annual budget stalemate. Our new Democratic governor unseated a one-term incumbent, which has happened before pretty much never, but our GOP would like to govern as it never happened this time, either. We have huge financial problems, and it will take billions-with-a-B to fix them, and nobody is going to love the solutions for where that comes from. It's going to take politicians with guts and vision to pull this off. Oh, and it will also take politicians with a basic understanding of how school costs really work.
Folmer had a bout with non-Hodgkins lymphoma a few years back (not as scary as some of the big-name cancers, but damn, it does suck), which may or may not have something to do with his passionate support for legalizing marijuana (it's "part of God's creation he has given us.") Beyond that, he has been a reliably conservative lawmaker; just a couple of years ago, he had a hand in the plan to empower universities to disempower local voters and taxpayers by chartering schools. Folmer loves him some choice. Yup. Vice-Chair of the Education Committee.
So here comes Folmer with a piece that ran first on his own web page and then was picked up by the Patriot News site. It's worth a look to understand some of the misconceptions running around the state capital.
Folmer opens with a bunch of numbers, but his basic point is "OMGZ!! We are spend so many of the moneys on schools! Soooo much!!!!!" He is particularly concerned that, as much as we spend, now Governor Tom Wolf wants to spend more.
Folmer cites (as he often does) the line from the state constitution about education: “The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education to serve the needs of the Commonwealth.” And the he arrives at his point:
The current system is far from efficient: for each dollar invested in education, just 37 cents goes into classrooms. Most of the money -- 62 percent -- goes to the salaries, healthcare, continuing education, pensions, and other benefits of the adults in education. How many of us would support a charity where just 38 percent of the monies collected go to the purpose of the charity while 62 percent goes for overhead?
I've run into this misunderstanding before with people from the business world. I once listened to one of my own board members, who owned a concrete business, express absolute astonishment that such a high percentage of the school budget was personnel costs.
Folmer and others like him are failing to understand how costs break down in a sector that provides a service. Schools don't make anything; they don't spend big money on raw materials, or marketing, or equipment to turn the raw material into a finished product.
Folmer's contention that just 37 cents goes into the classroom is just wrong. The "adults in education" also go into the classroom. Every cent spent on a teacher goes straight into a classroom.
A school is not a charity, and teachers are not "overhead." A school provides a valuable service, and teachers are the people who actually do the work. A sports team that wants to be successful-- either in terms or winning or in drawing fans and making money (all of which are, of course, linked)-- does not try to build success by cutting its personnel costs to the bone. The Yankees do not list A-Rod as an overhead cost.
After bemoaning how people react poorly to him when he cites his "facts," Folmer wraps up with this:
To me, education should focus first – and always – on students. However, in the current debate over education funding, students are used mostly to demand more and more money – because: "it's for the kids."
As vice-chair of the education committee, Folmer is surely aware that Pennsylvania has the worst spending gap between rich and poor schools in the nation. Well, maybe he's aware of it. Folmer is the former head of the ed committee, and he wrote about what he learned in that position. He is disappointed in the teachers unions, and he likes to talk to bright, sparkly students. He knows that the PA pension is a mess, and he expects that people will want to spend more money on schools. And to fix all this....well, nothing. But to address the funding gap will, in fact, require a bunch of money; if he doesn't think so, Folmer needs to explain what other solution would address the issue. If he thinks PA should embrace its spot at the bottom of the heap proudly, then he needs to go ahead and make his case for that.
Finding the political will to deal with PA's education problems is going to be hard. Right now we're stuck in our annual budget stalemate. Our new Democratic governor unseated a one-term incumbent, which has happened before pretty much never, but our GOP would like to govern as it never happened this time, either. We have huge financial problems, and it will take billions-with-a-B to fix them, and nobody is going to love the solutions for where that comes from. It's going to take politicians with guts and vision to pull this off. Oh, and it will also take politicians with a basic understanding of how school costs really work.
Friday, July 24, 2015
Bill Bennett's Baloney
William Bennett appeared on Campbell Brown's reformster PR site to stick up for the Common Core, but he ignores some inconvenient truths in the process.
The first stretcher is in his thesis-title: the GOP is wrong to run away from the Common Core-- because the standards are working. "Working" is a heck of a subjective term here, but let's see where he's going, shall we?
He starts with some history, noting that many GOP governors who used to love the Core have decided to dump the standards because it's politically expedient to do so. He is not wrong, but he conveniently ignores parts of the story. Perhaps most notable is that so many of these states actually adopted the standards before they were actually written. Bennett also gives a head nod to the notion that "federal overreach" sullied the otherwise beauteous standards, as if the standards would have had a chance of adoption without the full force of federal coercion and cash behind them (spoiler alert: they would not have).
So the story is not, "States adopted educational standards because they examined the standards and decided that Common Core would make education in their states great. Now those same state leaders are dumping the Core for crass political reasons."
No, the story is, "Some politicians adopted a policy because they thought it would be politically (and financially) advantageous to do so, and then dropped that policy when it became politically advantageous to do so." This is not a new story, and it is not a surprising story, and the degree to which career politicians pretend to be surprised by it is baffling.
Bennett correctly calls out Chris Christie for the hypocrisy of dismissing the Core without making any "substantive policy changes." That's fair, but again-- adopting the Core was a political gesture, and so is disowning it. I'm shocked-- shocked, I tell you.
Bennett then embarks on a journey of logic-chopping and baloney-slicing.
Christie recognizes that New Jersey still needs tough, internationally benchmarked standards that resemble CCSS.
Well, except that CCSS is not internationally benchmarked, and never has been. And the word "tough" is meaningless rhetoric. Something can be tough and still be a waste of everyone's time, like sitting through the film version of Les Mis or listening to twenty-four straight hours of heavy metal polka music.
Many polls indicate that the American people support higher and more rigorous standards and testing.
Let's pretend that those poll results aren't baloney in their own right. Let's pretend that the word "higher" means something when applied to standards. None of that means that the Common Core (Bennett carefully skips around how the brand name does in the polls ) is a hit with anyone. I can say that I am really hungry and would like to eat, but if you bring me a plate of raw liver covered with fried kale, I will still send it back. "But you said you wanted supper," you might say, but you'd be silly to do so.
Bennett then repeats his titular assertion that the Core are "working," which is yet another very vague rhetorical flourish. Does he have evidence?
In a word, no.
Bennett instead brings up the Achieve Honesty Gap report, a report with all sorts of problems, such as treating NAEP as a benchmark test. Oddly enough for Bennett's argument, the Achieve report also doesn't mention the Common Core, ever. Bennett's point is that the Big Standardized Test results are getting more in line with NAEP results. This assumes a great many things, not the least of which is that BS Tests are giving us a real measure of how Core-tastic students are, but since there are many parts of the Core that will never be on the BS Test (collaborative learning, reading full works, and critical thinking, for starters), it seems unlikely that the Core tests are even measuring what they claim to intend to measure.
But Bennett's baloney-fest isn't over.
Christie has every right to call for a review of the standards in New Jersey, in fact, most states review their standards every few years anyway.
(Yes, Bennett seems to want to mostly spank Christie in this piece). Bennett is also conveniently forgetting that the Common Core Standards were carefully constructed NOT to be reviewed every few years or even ever. Set in cement, copyrighted, and with states pledged to add no more than fifteen percent and to change not a whit or tittle, the Core also had no mechanism in place for review or revisit, and the architects left the scene quickly for pricey new gigs.
Given the Core pushback and the lack of any authoritative body to oversee anything, the copyright issue has evaporated. But CCSS was designed not to change a bit, and certainly not to be reviewed by the states. In that sentence, Bennett himself has made the case for dropping the Core.
Bennett also invokes the doctrine of Core Inevitability, a sort of sour grapes argument that says, "Fine, make your own standards. But they will inevitably look like the Common Core because CCSS is so close to the Platonic ideal of education standards that all standards must be a pale shadow of the Core awesomeness." This is a highly charitable and extra-fantastical view of the Common Core Standards, which remain the mediocre, poorly written product of educational amateurs.
Bennett finishes with one more hopeful eruption.
If a state ends up tweaking and renaming the standards, it will be acting in a way that is entirely consistent with how the Common Core was designed to function – as exemplar standards for states to improve and build upon.
Yeah, see above. That is very specifically NOT how the Common Core was designed to function. States were forbidden to improve or build upon CCSS. Bennett is entitled to be bitter and disappointed that same political winds that once filled CCSS sails have now deserted the SS Common Core. He is not entitled to pretend that the SS Common Core was built to be some sort of mighty, nimble ocean vessel when in fact it was always, from day one, a wobbly, leaky dinghy with a brick for a rudder.
The first stretcher is in his thesis-title: the GOP is wrong to run away from the Common Core-- because the standards are working. "Working" is a heck of a subjective term here, but let's see where he's going, shall we?
He starts with some history, noting that many GOP governors who used to love the Core have decided to dump the standards because it's politically expedient to do so. He is not wrong, but he conveniently ignores parts of the story. Perhaps most notable is that so many of these states actually adopted the standards before they were actually written. Bennett also gives a head nod to the notion that "federal overreach" sullied the otherwise beauteous standards, as if the standards would have had a chance of adoption without the full force of federal coercion and cash behind them (spoiler alert: they would not have).
So the story is not, "States adopted educational standards because they examined the standards and decided that Common Core would make education in their states great. Now those same state leaders are dumping the Core for crass political reasons."
No, the story is, "Some politicians adopted a policy because they thought it would be politically (and financially) advantageous to do so, and then dropped that policy when it became politically advantageous to do so." This is not a new story, and it is not a surprising story, and the degree to which career politicians pretend to be surprised by it is baffling.
Bennett correctly calls out Chris Christie for the hypocrisy of dismissing the Core without making any "substantive policy changes." That's fair, but again-- adopting the Core was a political gesture, and so is disowning it. I'm shocked-- shocked, I tell you.
Bennett then embarks on a journey of logic-chopping and baloney-slicing.
Christie recognizes that New Jersey still needs tough, internationally benchmarked standards that resemble CCSS.
Well, except that CCSS is not internationally benchmarked, and never has been. And the word "tough" is meaningless rhetoric. Something can be tough and still be a waste of everyone's time, like sitting through the film version of Les Mis or listening to twenty-four straight hours of heavy metal polka music.
Many polls indicate that the American people support higher and more rigorous standards and testing.
Let's pretend that those poll results aren't baloney in their own right. Let's pretend that the word "higher" means something when applied to standards. None of that means that the Common Core (Bennett carefully skips around how the brand name does in the polls ) is a hit with anyone. I can say that I am really hungry and would like to eat, but if you bring me a plate of raw liver covered with fried kale, I will still send it back. "But you said you wanted supper," you might say, but you'd be silly to do so.
Bennett then repeats his titular assertion that the Core are "working," which is yet another very vague rhetorical flourish. Does he have evidence?
In a word, no.
Bennett instead brings up the Achieve Honesty Gap report, a report with all sorts of problems, such as treating NAEP as a benchmark test. Oddly enough for Bennett's argument, the Achieve report also doesn't mention the Common Core, ever. Bennett's point is that the Big Standardized Test results are getting more in line with NAEP results. This assumes a great many things, not the least of which is that BS Tests are giving us a real measure of how Core-tastic students are, but since there are many parts of the Core that will never be on the BS Test (collaborative learning, reading full works, and critical thinking, for starters), it seems unlikely that the Core tests are even measuring what they claim to intend to measure.
But Bennett's baloney-fest isn't over.
Christie has every right to call for a review of the standards in New Jersey, in fact, most states review their standards every few years anyway.
(Yes, Bennett seems to want to mostly spank Christie in this piece). Bennett is also conveniently forgetting that the Common Core Standards were carefully constructed NOT to be reviewed every few years or even ever. Set in cement, copyrighted, and with states pledged to add no more than fifteen percent and to change not a whit or tittle, the Core also had no mechanism in place for review or revisit, and the architects left the scene quickly for pricey new gigs.
Given the Core pushback and the lack of any authoritative body to oversee anything, the copyright issue has evaporated. But CCSS was designed not to change a bit, and certainly not to be reviewed by the states. In that sentence, Bennett himself has made the case for dropping the Core.
Bennett also invokes the doctrine of Core Inevitability, a sort of sour grapes argument that says, "Fine, make your own standards. But they will inevitably look like the Common Core because CCSS is so close to the Platonic ideal of education standards that all standards must be a pale shadow of the Core awesomeness." This is a highly charitable and extra-fantastical view of the Common Core Standards, which remain the mediocre, poorly written product of educational amateurs.
Bennett finishes with one more hopeful eruption.
If a state ends up tweaking and renaming the standards, it will be acting in a way that is entirely consistent with how the Common Core was designed to function – as exemplar standards for states to improve and build upon.
Yeah, see above. That is very specifically NOT how the Common Core was designed to function. States were forbidden to improve or build upon CCSS. Bennett is entitled to be bitter and disappointed that same political winds that once filled CCSS sails have now deserted the SS Common Core. He is not entitled to pretend that the SS Common Core was built to be some sort of mighty, nimble ocean vessel when in fact it was always, from day one, a wobbly, leaky dinghy with a brick for a rudder.
Send Word to Harrisburg
If you are in Pennsylvania, and you care about the proliferation of our lousy Keystone and PSSA tests (our version of the federally-mandated Big Standardized Tests), then you have not just an opportunity, but an obligation.
The PA State House Education Committee is having public hearings about the state of PA testing next Wednesday, July 29 (10AM in room G50 of the Irvis Building, 450 Commonwealth Ave, Harrisburg, if you're in the neighborhood).
But if, like me, you have a life and obligations and commitments and you can't make it to harrisburg, there is an alternative. From our friends at Opt Out PA:
If you are an educator or district administrator in PA with a unique view on the negative impacts on high stakes testing, please consider submitting written testimony by Monday the 27th to the following contact: Jonathan Berger, Executive Director, Education Committee (R) PA House of Representatives at jberger@pahousegop.comAsk that your comments be entered into the hearing record, and your testimony will be disseminated to all committee members prior to the hearing. For resources on relevant legislation and opting out of high stakes tests visit http://optoutpa.blogspot.com/
So, I know what I'm doing over the next few days.
I have no idea what the outcome (or intended outcome) of the hearing is supposed to be, nor how much attention the letters will receive. But even if they aren't read, handing a legislature a giant stack of print-outs with the note that they're all opposed to testing-- well, that matters.
It's easy to argue that there's no point in speaking up because the game is rigged and the outcome is already set. Maybe. But I still don't want to imagine the folks railroading education being able to say, "Well, we asked, and nobody said anything, so we figured it was okay." It's like the old sports saw about the number of shots you don't take. People who speak up may not always be heard, but people who don't speak at all go unheard 100% of the time. We should shoot for the better odds. Write a letter before Monday.
The PA State House Education Committee is having public hearings about the state of PA testing next Wednesday, July 29 (10AM in room G50 of the Irvis Building, 450 Commonwealth Ave, Harrisburg, if you're in the neighborhood).
But if, like me, you have a life and obligations and commitments and you can't make it to harrisburg, there is an alternative. From our friends at Opt Out PA:
If you are an educator or district administrator in PA with a unique view on the negative impacts on high stakes testing, please consider submitting written testimony by Monday the 27th to the following contact: Jonathan Berger, Executive Director, Education Committee (R) PA House of Representatives at jberger@pahousegop.comAsk that your comments be entered into the hearing record, and your testimony will be disseminated to all committee members prior to the hearing. For resources on relevant legislation and opting out of high stakes tests visit http://optoutpa.blogspot.com/
So, I know what I'm doing over the next few days.
I have no idea what the outcome (or intended outcome) of the hearing is supposed to be, nor how much attention the letters will receive. But even if they aren't read, handing a legislature a giant stack of print-outs with the note that they're all opposed to testing-- well, that matters.
It's easy to argue that there's no point in speaking up because the game is rigged and the outcome is already set. Maybe. But I still don't want to imagine the folks railroading education being able to say, "Well, we asked, and nobody said anything, so we figured it was okay." It's like the old sports saw about the number of shots you don't take. People who speak up may not always be heard, but people who don't speak at all go unheard 100% of the time. We should shoot for the better odds. Write a letter before Monday.
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