It's Morning Edition on KRPS; I'm Fred Fletcher-Fierro. These days, we have at least one daily reminder in the news that teachers are leaving the profession. One headline from a recent Kansas Reflector article reads, "Educators say attacking Kansas teachers is GOP strategy to push private schools ".
The educator referenced in the report is a former Kansas Teacher of the Year, Sam Neill. The shortage of teachers in Missouri and Kansas has led school districts to move to four-day school weeks.
The 2023 recipient of the Kansas Teacher of the Year Award, Brian Skinner, recently visited Pittsburg State University to meet with future educators. Skinner says the shortage goes beyond teachers.
"The teacher shortage is real. And not only the teacher shortage but the substitute shortage and the paraeducator shortage. Those are critical for our profession.
Paraeducators are some of the more unvalued people within the educator profession, and they are so vital for our profession helping students succeed."
According to figures published by the National Education Association last February, 55% of teachers polled said they were thinking of leaving the profession. One reason why may be the lack of adequate compensation.
According to the job search website Talent.com, paraeducators earn just over $29,000 annually in Kansas. Skinner describes paraeducators as the backbone of the classroom.
"Paraecuators are, are they to help support students. They provide individual interventions. They are there to be able to give extra assistance and care. Provide accommodations and modifications.
They really help support what the teacher is doing in the classroom so that each student is able to really understand and move forward as they are best capable."
Teachers and paraeducators are like a second family for students.
My kids have admitted that they have called their teachers, Mom. When school is in session, students spend more time with their teachers and classmates. Brian Skinner's connection to the teaching profession is very close to his heart.
"I come from a family of teachers. And I think that's true of a lot of teachers. They have some sort of connection to start with.
Part of our message that we send as a Kansas Teacher of the Year Team is, it's about connections. And those connections inspire people to do what they're doing.
So part of my connection was coming from a family of teachers. But the other connection is I've got my junior history teacher Ms. Laura Pullman from Place Center High School.
She inspired a lot of the belief in myself of what I can do academically, and that sort of pushed me into the career of education and to work and help other people.
I try and take that model within my classroom of pushing and inspiring other students, helping just build that self-belief worth so they can become their best self."
Teaching is a team effort, though the number of team members entering the profession and remaining in it is declining.
According to data last fall from the Kansas State Department of Education's seasonal Teacher Vacancy and Supply Report, teacher stability — or the percentage of
educators who remained in the same district — dipped to 87.3%, down from 89.5% a year prior. Five percent of teachers changed districts.
Regardless of teacher staffing issues, Skinner remains committed.
"There are a lot of barriers with teaching. But there are a lot of barriers with every job. Every job is tough, every job is difficult, but it's about how you can work around those barriers.
For example, people talk about apathy a lot within the classroom; well, students don't care, they have their head down, they don't want to work hard. And not to say that is never the case, but sometimes what may seem like a barrier on the surface is a misunderstanding.
Sometimes students who put their head down because they are not receiving instruction in a way that best suits them to be able to learn, and they're frustrated and don't know how to express their frustration which is very different than them not wanting to do something.
Which is why it's so important that we get as many people in the profession as we can. That we have the funding to be able to support educators in the profession so that we can make sure that what may seem like barriers are being able to work so that we can help students."
Another critical metric is teacher retention. According to Kansas state data released at the start of this school year, only 86.3% continue teaching after their third year.
That figure had been in the lower 90s for the past ten years.
Skinner believed that today's teachers, connecting with students and creating a positive outlook for the profession would revive the number of individuals who want to make it their life's work.
"Everything that we do as public educators is a team. That team includes the teacher; it includes the paraeducators; it includes the custodians; it includes the secretary, administrative administrators, as well as the parents, and the students.
I mean, we all have to work collectively to work together as a team. But the teacher shortage is a real thing.
I think part of what we have to do is celebrate the profession first and inspire people to the positive things that public education brings so that people are motivated and want to go into the profession—wanting to be on that flip side of the coin.
Everyone can remember their favorite teacher and that connection that they had; being able to be on the other side of that and be the one that inspires someone to do better and go forward is so worthwhile.
And I think the more we can do to celebrate the profession, the better we can do with promoting and helping that shortage."
