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Deanie Wimmer Reporting New research paints a dire picture for teacher shortages in Utah. The number of new teachers has plummeted while student populations are booming.
Last year Utah experienced a shortage of nearly 14-hundred teachers. We wanted to find out what schools are doing to ensure there's a qualified teacher in your child's classroom. So we talked to one of the recruiters for the state's largest school district.
Mary Anderson has the unenviable job of recruiting enough teachers to fill the vacancies in classrooms, and in the Jordan school district, the numbers are staggering.
Mary Anderson, Jordan School District: "In the Jordan district last year they hired 700 new teachers for the district."
Just in her school, Union Middle, where she's also the principal, she had to replace 30-percent of her staff. She faces what researchers call a dwindling interest in the profession, largely due to low salaries. For her, the toughest jobs to fill are in math and science. Last year, Utah graduated only seven new chemistry teachers.
Mary Anderson: "There may be more fields that are more lucrative that require the skill level that they have with a math or science degree that will take them out of teaching and into a different field with their knowledge."
She recruits on every Utah college campus. She attends nearly a dozen recruiting fairs out of state and now starts in November to fill next year's slots. This year, a new experience, she hired a teacher she'd never met.
Mary Anderson: "I had to do a phone interview because at the time she was out of state. So at the time we hired her, I'd never met her."
Her experience mirrors new state research that shows a dire situation in teacher supply and demand.
David Sperry, Former Dean College of Education: "We are seeing sort of a flat production of new teachers despite the fact that we've added four colleges of education."
Yet every year we're adding around 14-thousand students, that's the equivalent of a new Provo School District. So understandably, this recruiter has more work to do.
Add to all that nearly half of Utah's teachers will be eligible to retire within 10 years. Recruiters will keep working frantically. The goal of this research effort is to form a task force of business and education leaders that will present policy recommendations and long term solutions this spring.
