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- Teacher Shortage, from Michigan Radio
- Educators Push For Bills to Ease Substitute Teacher Shortage, from MLive
- Crisis in Teaching Means Crisis for Michigan's Kids, from the Detroit News
- What Can We Do About Teacher Turnover, from Edutopia
The teaching shortage is real, and it's a problem. I work in a suburban school district and it is November, and we still have teaching vacancies. It is difficult for teachers to attend professional development to improve their craft because there are not enough substitute teachers to cover their classes.
Teachers go into the profession because they want to make a positive difference in the world. There is no other profession with the capacity to shape the futures of so many others. The work is challenging, yet very rewarding. As a nation, we must do much more to fully appreciate and support the work of teachers.
The bills that are being considered in the Michigan legislature, related to allowing retirees to return to the classroom as substitute teachers will help. However, I think that policymakers should focus on strategies to attract talented individuals into the profession and improving teacher retention.
The profession is losing out when high school grads consider career options. When they learn that teacher pay has gone down each year for the past five years, they look for other options. That's what my daughter did. She was interested in being a math teacher, and she would have been an excellent one, yet she chose to be an engineer. She weighed the pros and cons of each profession and the teaching profession lost the battle. Her situation is not unique.
Every career depends on the work of teachers who are charged with people building. There is nothing more important than that. Please do whatever you can do to support policies that will help attract and keep teachers in the classroom.
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