Last week, the Mississippi Department of Education had more than 2,100 job openings listed on its website. For local school officials, it means that it is tougher to fill vacancies.
“Currently there’s just a shortage of teachers overall,” Columbia School District Superintendent Jason Harris said last week following a board meeting. “We had a Gulf Coast Consortium meeting last week with a group of superintendents on the Coast. The No. 1 thing we talked about with the teacher shortage was how we as a whole need to do a better job of bringing in and keeping teachers.”
Harris said that at the moment, the Columbia School District has “just a few openings at the moment.”
“We’re trying to find a high school math teacher,” he said. “We need to add an assistant baseball coach and a few things that we’re trying to fill. The shortage really hit us a few years ago. We changed the qualifications for math teachers and lessened the requirements. The problem is that we had one of the highest standards in the country. Not only are we in a rural state where we don’t have many people moving, but we also have the highest stipulations to meet as a teacher.”
Marion County Superintendent Wendy Bracey says currently they’ve secured the teachers they need for elementary schools, but they still have some openings at the high school level.
“Teacher quality is the single most important factor in student achievement. Every student should be taught by excellent teachers,” Bracey said. “Our job as a district is to work hard to recruit the best and retain the best. We had our first teacher job fair this year and were able to secure several teachers from that event.”
Statewide, one problem is teachers from other states often find it difficult to move here.
“Reciprocity has been an issue,” Harris said. “The state department is trying to work on that, but there are a lot of issues with it. You may be a teacher here, but you can’t go in over there with your license and go in.”
Columbia isn’t the only district seeking a math teacher, for example, Harris said.
“Right now I know that Biloxi High School needs a math teacher,” he said. “Three years ago, we started calling all of the different universities. For example, you’d call Mississippi State and they had seven graduates, Ole Miss had 10 and Southern had six. That’s total – in the state. There are 20 people to chose from that are going to every school district in the state. These are graduates with math degrees. It’s very difficult to find people.”
Harris said a variety of factors help add up to a shortage of qualified applicants.
“One of the problems is the issues is that you don’t have as many people going into education,” he said. “We’ve been discussing a lot of this among superintendents that really it’s our own fault. A lot of times we don’t we don’t promote it to be how great it really is. Every profession is going to have its struggles. But honestly, to be able to come in and work and have time in the summers and everything make it the greatest profession. At the end of the day, when you teach someone and you know the impact your having on their life, is it the most financially rewarding, no, is it the most impactful – yes. We’ve got to do a better job of that – we’ve got to do a better job of selling our high school seniors, when they graduate that they need to look this way.”
Some don’t want to go into teaching now for a variety of factors, according to Harris.
“There is a lot of accountability that goes into teaching at this time,” he said. “It’s tremendous accountability. We’ve discussed this among teachers and administrators. We’re judged by a test score, that’s the rules and we have to play by them. I that people look at the stress and the financial. There are a lot of jobs out there where people have four year degrees and can’t get a job.
“We’ve got to do a better job of selling our profession as to how great it really is. You can earn a good living and you still have a pension. There’s a lot to be said for that. Many people looked at our profession as their way to give back. This is not a charity – it is a true hardworking profession that people dedicate their lives to. It’s a challenging profession; however it’s a very rewarding profession.”
Harris said officials across the country are looking at options.
“Do you offer incentives for math teachers for example? That’s what private businesses do,” he said. “If you need someone, you need to incentivize. All of us are in this together. It’s my job to make sure Columbia is successful. In the end, it benefits all of us when our state is successful.”
