Abstract:

As the current school year (2022-23) began around the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States, public and private education organizations experienced a significant staff vacancy crisis. There are not enough fully licensed, or provisionally licensed, educators to fill the open positions in Virginia. This situation will negatively impact students in the foreseeable future.

Enrollment numbers in teacher and leader preparation programs have declined steadily and educators are leaving the profession for jobs that offer more reasonable pay, respect, working conditions, and safe facilities.

In Virginia, provisionally licensed teachers do not yet meet requirements for full licensure. Many have never received formal training in such critical areas as child development, classroom management, or creating appropriate assessments of student learning.

Last year, approximately 1 out of every 10 public school teachers in Virginia was not equipped with traditional training or qualifications. This academic year, 2022-23, Virginia has over 3,500 teacher vacancies. This is approximately three and a half times the number of teacher vacancies in 2019-20. The number of un- and underqualified educators is growing in alarming ways.

We know that underprepared teachers, with the desire but not the qualifications to teach, leave the profession at two to three times the rate of their fully prepared peers. This adds to the teacher turnover churn. We want all teachers in Virginia to succeed and remain in the profession.

Well-trained, equipped educators take time to prepare. Concerns surround how school principals in Virginia, and across the United States, will be able to provide the significant additional resources required to support, train, and retain an increasingly underqualified teaching population. This is not a situation we can easily repair in the next few years.

While the current teacher shortage is exacerbated by the pandemic, this problem is emblematic of a much larger and long-lived American crisis – the devaluation and degradation of education and educators by society, as a whole.

Reports of teacher treatment across the country, including low pay, school violence, and teacher demoralization are some examples of the hurdles education in America faces in 2023. Education as a profession has become so unattractive that we cannot build a sustainable workforce for teachers, staff, and school leaders. Of particular concern now is the leadership pipeline. If we draw our most skilled leaders from the pool of our most skilled teachers, what happens to the leadership pipeline when skilled teachers leave the profession? We are heading for a significant systemic crisis.

This crisis was looming long before Covid-19 closures in March 2020. It is a cultural and moral issue regarding what American society values. This session will explore and facilitate discussion regarding the challenges facing education in America and through the world, data that tells crucial stories in education, and how educational leaders might address the staffing issues of the future.

Keywords:

Vacancy Crisis, Pandemic, degradation of education.