Meet the Teachers
by Camille Hedrick, Potomac Falls High School
Original text © 2004 Camille Hedrick
The Teacher Shortage
The current teacher shortage is a combination of many factors. Growing enrollments, retirements, legislature mandating smaller classes, migration to other schools and attrition have all combined to produce the shortage (Florida Department of Education, 2003; Ingersoll, 1999; Lalley, 2001; McCrieght, 2000; Merrow, 2002; Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium,1999; Resta et al.,2001, Zakariya, 2000 ). America’s classrooms will need 2.2 million more teachers over the next ten years, nearly double the number of current teachers (Duarte, 2000; Florida Department of Education, 2003; Hardy, 1998; Hope, 1999; Martin, 2000; Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium,1999; National Education Association, 2002; Ruckel, 2000; Tirozzi, 2001). In 2002, the National Education Association predicted that half of those who would be teaching in ten years have yet to be hired.
America’s anticipated need for teachers will increase by at least 200,000 annually, and will not be met by college education programs, which graduate approximately 150,000 per year (Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium,1999; Resta, et al., 2001; Ruckel, 2000). Another source of concern is the fact that in 2000 McCrieght provided research that indicated only 60 percent of those trained to teach do so, while in that same year over 1000 teaching positions in Virginia were filled by unendorsed teachers. A study by the Virginia Department of Education (2000) concluded that Virginia’s 37 teacher preparatory institutions will fall far short of graduating enough candidates to fill the projected openings in the public schools. Other states cite similar statistics. For example, North Carolina graduates 3,300 new teachers each year, but anticipates hiring 10,000 each year for the next ten years (Easley et al., 2003).
