States easing substitute teaching requirements to soften shortage impacts – By Anna Merod, K-12 Dive
The 5,600-student Ridley School District in Folsom, Pennsylvania, is not immune to the ongoing and worsening substitute teacher shortage nationwide.
“I think this month is probably going to be our toughest month as we look at the number of [teacher] absences,” said Ridley Superintendent Lee Ann Wentzel. “Right now with the quarantining, the isolation — that’s compounded the issues.”
On Friday, for example, Wentzel said the district had eight teacher absences left unfilled by substitute teachers.
Since schools nationwide have returned from winter break, the omicron variant and ongoing school staffing shortages have significantly impacted some districts’ abilities to continue in-person learning.
“This is not just going to be a short-term issue. We saw this coming, and as our profession has taken some hits out in the public … schools of education had significant declines in enrollment at the higher ed level,” Wentzel said, referring to strains on the teacher pipeline even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. “So our pool was already thin going into this, and that’s sad on a number of fronts. You want people who want to be in this profession and want to pursue it.”
A new report from the Illinois Association of Regional Superintendents of Schools found 96% of 663 districts surveyed facing a substitute teacher shortage, while 88% said they have a teacher shortage problem.
Tennessee lawmakers advance school voucher bill targeting remote education – By Marta Aldrich, Chalkbeat
A key Senate panel approved legislation Wednesday that would provide public money for private school tuition for Tennessee students whose school systems do not offer in-person learning all year.
However, lawmakers amended the bill first to remove a provision that also would have extended vouchers to students whose parents disagree with school mask mandates in their district.
The 6-2 vote in the Senate Education Committee came after only 30 minutes of discussion about a controversial voucher policy that has been debated for years in Tennessee’s legislature and is currently being challenged in court.
Meanwhile, dozens of schools across Tennessee are closed this week — or have moved remote temporarily — because of staffing challenges caused by COVID’s omicron variant.
How the state plans to help schools hire hundreds of mental health staffers – By Joshua Vinson, WZZM13.com
It's a startling statistic. According to the American School Counselor Association, Michigan is ranked among the worst in the nation for its student-to-counselor ratio, and that stat isn't sitting well with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
Whitmer recently signed a new bill, giving schools money to hire more school counselors which is something especially needed right now amid this ongoing pandemic.
Many of you reached out to 13 ON YOUR SIDE and said you think it is a great idea the state is taking the mental and physical health of our youth seriously by adding these professionals in schools across the state.
At the same time, many industries are facing staffing shortages and health staffers are hard to come by. Additionally, the state is facing a great challenge as it ranks second worst in the nation in its student-to-school-counselor ratio.
New Mexico is pushing to be a 'model' for how race is taught in U.S. schools – By the Associated Press on NPR
A proposal to overhaul New Mexico's social studies standards has stirred debate over how race should be taught in schools, with thousands of parents and teachers weighing in on changes that would dramatically increase instruction related to racial and social identity beginning in kindergarten.
The revisions in the state are ambitious. New Mexico officials say they hope their standards can be a model for the country of social studies teaching that is culturally responsive, as student populations grow increasingly diverse.
As elsewhere, the move toward more open discussion of race has prompted angry rebukes, with some critics blasting it as racist or Marxist. But the responses also provide a window into how others are wrestling with how and when race should be taught to children beyond the polarizing debates over material branded as "critical race theory."
The responses have not broken down along racial lines, with Indigenous and Latino parents among those expressing concern in one of the country's least racially segregated states. While debates elsewhere have centered on the teaching of enslavement of Black people, some discussions in New Mexico, which is 49% Hispanic and 11% Native American, have focused on the legacy of Spanish conquistadors.
"We refuse to be categorized as victims or oppressors," wrote Michael Franco, a retired Hispanic air traffic controller in Albuquerque who said the standards appeared aimed at categorizing children by race and ethnicity and undercutting the narrative of the American Dream.
