Mississippi Facing Critical Teacher Shortage

[Zincwarrior]

A serious problem that has only flipped into overdrive with the Covid years.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/01/19/teacher-shortage-mississippi/

A snippet:

The geometry teacher is a recording. The chemistry students often teach themselves.​

Teacher shortages are getting renewed attention this year. But in Mississippi and other Southern states, this crisis dates back more than a decade.​

ROSEDALE, Miss. — It’s near the end of the day at West Bolivar High School, and Jordan Mosley is stuck. The 15-year-old sophomore stares at her laptop and restarts the video.
Her teacher that day is a stranger — a nameless long-haired man on the screen. He explains two-column geometry proofs and how students could use the software to complete them. “Prove if the length of AB is equal to the length of EF,” the man says.

But there is no one to ask for help in this classroom, where students stare sleepily at laptops amid the din of a portable air conditioner. There is only a teacher’s assistant who can print out additional worksheets if they run into trouble. So Jordan, a top student, decides to wait until she can see Ms. Butler, the high school’s popular math teacher — and its only one.

Advertisement


The virtual session is not a concession to pandemic learning or a stopgap for a teacher who is sick. It is how sophomores are expected to learn geometry this year after the district could not find a teacher. In the Mississippi Delta, where schools have historically been shortchanged, teaching candidates — especially those who know math — are hard to come by.
A school in rural Arizona asked a Filipina teacher to migrate just to teach junior high
The nature and the severity of the teacher crisis differ radically from state to state, district to district and even school to school. Some districts have only recently started experiencing teacher shortages, but in many Southern states, the problem has been long-standing and only gotten worse. It doesn’t help either that the state has shortchanged districts like West Bolivar Consolidated by millions of dollars, failing to fund a program that would send more money to poor districts.
Researchers have found that schools that serve high percentages of minority students and students in poverty have more difficulty finding and retaining qualified educators than Whiter, more affluent schools. The West Bolivar Consolidated School District is 98 percent Black, and 100 percent of children qualify for free or reduced-price meals.

Will Smith, superintendent of the West Bolivar Consolidated School District. (Rory Doyle for The Washington Post)
Across the country, states and school districts desperate for candidates have resorted to shortening school weeks to make the job more appealing, eliminating requirements and, in nearby Oklahoma, permitting school districts to hire people without any college education.

In the West Bolivar Consolidated School District, keeping schools staffed is a high-wire balancing act that relies on long-term substitutes, virtual classes and hiring educators to teach subjects they have no training in. Throughout the fall, Superintendent Will Smith said, the district had bent so many rules to hire educators that it risked losing accreditation.
“It’s not fair,” he said, “but what else do we have?”

 

[SweetSue92]

A serious problem that has only flipped into overdrive with the Covid years.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/01/19/teacher-shortage-mississippi/

A snippet:

My fellow conservatives: "teachers are groomers and indoctrinators; no one trusts them. They are also overpaid and underworked. They get summers off!"

Real world: Blistering teacher shortage, schools going to 4 day weeks

My fellow conservatives: **crickets**

 

[Tommy Tainant]

Why would people get into teaching. Schools are dangerous places.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

“…in many Southern states, the problem has been long-standing and only gotten worse.” ibid

Southern states as in Republican-controlled states; teacher shortages the consequence of failed, wrongheaded conservative fiscal and education policies, the consequence of Republicans making education and funding for education the lowest of priorities.

 

[initforme]

My fellow conservatives: "teachers are groomers and indoctrinators; no one trusts them. They are also overpaid and underworked. They get summers off!"

Real world: Blistering teacher shortage, schools going to 4 day weeks

My fellow conservatives: **crickets**

Some people regardless of affiliation are clueless.

 

[Unkotare]

Why would people get into teaching. ....

Because some people care about students.

 

[Woodznutz]

Why would people get into teaching. Schools are dangerous places.

Apparently, lots of would-be teachers are asking themselves that question as well.

 

[Woodznutz]

Because some people care about students.

Teachers can only 'care' to the extent that the administrators allow them to (generally speaking).

 

[BothWings]

My fellow conservatives: "teachers are groomers and indoctrinators; no one trusts them. They are also overpaid and underworked. They get summers off!"

Real world: Blistering teacher shortage, schools going to 4 day weeks

My fellow conservatives: **crickets**

It's not teachers who are necessarily the woke psychos. It's their unions. If you like your job you'll conform to the prescribed union culture and status quo. It is so easy for a teacher to be slandered and scandalized in a heartbeat when they don't conform to those standards....and they know it. Many people are becoming highly aware of what's going on with the woke movement and how teachers unions and the Democrats are using it to try to take control of our schools. The same thing is happening with the police. The Dems want police who will eventually serve as Brownshirts. Good people don't want the job anymore. Same with teachers.

 

[Woodznutz]

Real world: Blistering teacher shortage, schools going to 4 day weeks

It will get worse if unqualified teachers are hired to fill in the gap.

 

[Unkotare]

.... If you like your job you'll conform to the prescribed union culture and status quo....

Bullshit.

 

[Jarlaxle]

Why would people get into teaching. Schools are dangerous places.

The three best reasons: June, July, an August.

 

[Unkotare]

Because some people care about students.

.