There are no guarantees that Oklahoma public schools will have enough teachers for every classroom when the 2024–2025 academic year begins this fall.
The Sooner State was already struggling with a significant teacher shortage when legislation was introduced earlier this year to lure former certified teachers back to schools.
The bill, House Bill 4017, which proposed $7,000 annual signing bonuses for up to five consecutive years for teachers with at least three years of experience, failed to make it to the Oklahoma Senate before the annual session ended last month.
The Oklahoma State Department of Education previously created a provision allowing individuals with non-teaching degrees to lead classrooms. Then, it went a step further and added an adjunct teacher program where vacancies in most grade levels and subject areas can be filled by applicants who don’t have a college degree, let alone any teaching experience. The law was initially passed as an emergency measure to mobilize part-time teachers quickly, but under a 2022 amendment, adjuncts can now teach five days a week.
All told, when the 2022-2023 school year began, there were 1,019 teacher vacancies, a significant increase from the 680 vacancies the year before that, according to the Oklahoma School Boards Association. Moreover, 85 percent of districts in that state also reported a shortage of substitute teachers.
The problem is blamed mainly on low pay. Tulsa state Rep. John Waldron, a Democrat, said education spending in the state sustained deep cuts prior to 2018. Teachers received double-digit raises in 2018 and 2019 to combat shrinking faculty rosters across the state, but by then, it was too little too late. Mr. Waldron, a former history teacher, set aside his love of teaching to influence public education through the state’s political system.
Educators have also complained about poor working conditions, low morale, and conflicts with parents, administrators, and school boards.
“I think what’s really in short supply is respect,” Mr. Waldron told the Epoch Times.
Demographics have also played a role in this trend, he said, noting that a heavy concentration of certified teachers are approaching retirement age while rural communities continue to lose population. But overall, the public-school population is growing, with about 700,000 K-12 students this year.
Mr. Waldron said there is little data so far to connect adjunct teachers to lower test scores or class performance, but he has noticed high turnover rates—especially in the highest-need, lowest-income districts—where “retrofitted” educators leave their new profession after a year or two.
“If you want to get into teaching,” he said, “you are likely to take the easiest career path. But now, we are constantly replacing these less comprehensively trained teachers. At this point, it’s just an upkeep to staffing, but no improvement to education.”
Earlier this spring, the University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma City Community College announced a partnership, “OU Teacher Bound X OCCC,” in which the two groups will work closely with teaching degree program candidates to find funding their studies, as well as help new teachers secure their first teaching job in K-12 public school districts.
According to the OU Teacher Bound X OCCC news release, enrollment in college and university teacher training programs across Oklahoma dropped by 80 percent between 2001 and 2018, and the state education department issued 3,780 emergency teaching certifications in 2022 alone.
Mr. Waldron said Oklahoma could reverse this negative trend with teacher staffing if the legislature and all of the 20-plus colleges and universities across the state take on a similar initiative.
“Bigger investments would yield better results,” he said.
