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Quick Fix vs. Meaningful Change

A Shortage of Teachers

By Blake West, President, Kansas National Education association

The day may be coming very soon when the new teacher next door will be entering the profession with minimal training in teaching and learning, possibly even without any practice-teaching experience.

As more and more of our profession retire and fewer candidates enter teacher preparation programs, shortages may extend beyond a few hard-to-fill areas.

Seeking to address this shortage is at the top of the agenda for the new Kansas State Board of Education.   The topic is also on the minds of many legislators.

For example, the House Education Committee kicked off the legislative term with a visit from the Kansas Teacher of the Year (KTOY) team. 

Legislators’ two biggest questions for the KTOY team centered on what to do with the No Child Left Behind act and strategies to get more teachers into the profession.

Unfortunately, the quick-fix strategy drawing the greatest interest is to dumb-down the path and preparation that it takes to become a teacher.

Some claim that anyone with a college degree in some other field should be able to teach… if only they didn’t have to “jump through hoops” like studying about how people learn and participating in practice teaching. 

Across the nation, a variety of alternate routes to teaching have sprung up.  In Kansas, some success has been found in programs like the one in Kansas City, KS, through Pittsburg State University.  But successful programs typically require years of intensive work and significant onsite support.

In programs that lack strong preparation, the results are clear:  50% or more of candidates leave the profession within only a few years and their students do worse on assessments for at least the teacher’s first two years in the classroom. 

In other words, if two shortcut teachers are hired in a school, by the third year it is likely that only one will still be teaching. 

Since only one will make it to the third year, that means that four out of five groups of students will have had substandard teaching.  Only the fifth group (the survivor’s third year) will measure up to the level of instruction of a beginning teacher from a full preparation program.

Are we satisfied with 80% of the classrooms of the future being shortchanged?  And realizing that students in poverty are more likely to have alternate-route teachers, are we willing to continually assign some of the highest need students to the teachers who are least able to meet their needs?

The KTOY team was patient and respectful when pressed with repeated legislator questions about shortcuts to teaching. 

But in a frank moment after the committee meeting, Josh Anderson (member of Olathe NEA, Kansas Teacher of the Year and National TOY finalist) gave his REAL answer:   “I’ll let you get your teaching license in just a few months so you can teach my child if you’ll let me get my medical license in only a few months so I can perform surgery on yours.”

Very simply, teaching is a complex process that requires a deep knowledge base in both content and pedagogy. 

Analyzing student work, identifying misconceptions, developing multiple strategies to explain content, individualizing assignments to particular students, making split-second instructional decisions, understanding child and adolescent development, etc. are complex skills that people who only have advanced content degrees simply don’t have.

So if shortcuts don’t work, how do we fix the teacher shortage?  There are THREE keys to addressing this challenge. 

First, salaries must be sufficiently attractive so that individuals are not sacrificing the welfare of their families in order to teach. 

Starting salaries and career earning potential must be improved to compete with other career options that prospective teachers might consider.

Second, we must enhance the status of the profession with the public.  Teachers need to have the support of parents and community members; they need to be recognized for overcoming tremendous challenges as they raise achievement for all students. 

We must have appropriate professional participation in decision-making about our classrooms, teaching strategies and curriculum materials. 

Frankly, quick routes to teaching for someone with a content degree is the worst possible thing to do to maintain professionalism, quality AND to attract promising candidates into the profession.

Finally, the quality of school leadership and administration must be emphasized.

Data from the recent teacher working conditions survey shows that teachers don’t change schools because of the poverty of their students… they change schools seeking a culture that respects and involves them as professionals.

KNEA’s strategic work is grounded in efforts to improve salaries, recruit promising students into the profession, maintain strong teacher preparation programs, provide intensive induction assistance for new teachers and engage in ongoing quality professional development throughout our careers. 

We also are working to develop teacher leaders and grow the next generation of collaborative, caring administrators.

Together, we must defend our profession against attacks from wrong-headed reformers who would decrease professional standards and preparation. 

Anything less than rigorous preparation is professional malpractice and shortchanges the students with whom we work.

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