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The United States’ growing teaching shortage: How it looks state by state

See fully interactive map below.

There are growing teacher shortages in various states across the country (despite some media reports that insist otherwise)  and the problem looks like it is only going to get worse. The numbers, which you can see in the interactive map below, tell the story.

According to a recent study, titled “A Coming Crisis in Teaching? Teacher Supply, Demand and Shortages in the U.S.” (see below):

Tens of thousands of teachers were hired in the fall of 2015 on emergency or temporary credentials to meet these needs, and the same pattern has emerged as schools opened in 2016. In addition to hiring individuals who are not prepared to teach, districts and schools facing shortages have a small number of undesirable options: They can increase class sizes, cancel classes, use short-term substitutes, or assign teachers from other fields to fill vacancies. All of these stopgap solutions undermine the quality of education, especially for the students who most need effective schools.

Nearly every state has reported some shortage of teachers to the U.S. Education Department, but the problems are different from state to state, according to the report, published by the nonprofit Learning Policy Institute, which is headed by Linda Darling-Hammond, seen as the nation’s leading expert on teacher preparation and Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus at Stanford University.

In 2015–16, 48 states identified special education as a shortage area in their reports to the Education Department, while 42 states reported shortages in mathematics, and 40 states reported shortages in science. More than 30 states identified high levels of shortage for teachers of English learners. The District reported shortages in these areas as well.

Why is there a shortage? Teacher morale, according to various surveys, has plummeted in recent years, with educators saying that school reform has made them the scapegoat for problems in public education. According to the report, teacher attrition remains at about 8 percent annually, and two-thirds of those who leave depart before retirement age, “most because of dissatisfaction with aspects of their teaching conditions.”

Meanwhile, with student enrollments projected to grow by 3 million over the next decade, teacher demand is growing at a time when fewer people are entering teacher preparation programs. Enrollments are down 35 percent and graduates have dropped by 23 percent between 2009 and 2014.

You can see a map published by the Learning Policy Institute that provides very detailed data for each state here.

You can see the full interactive map here.
Here’s the full report:

A Coming Crisis in Teaching REPORT[1] on Scribd

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