JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – With the start of the school year just weeks away, the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Educations says districts are still struggling to find teachers. 

For more than a year, lawmakers, business leaders and educators have been researching what can be done to combat the teacher shortage. Last year, the focus was on teacher pay. Now, the commission is pivoting to culture and climate and the impact it’s having in the classroom. 

“The stress of having to manage a classroom with more students exhibiting challenging behaviors, that seems to be sort of at the heart of the burnout,” said Sen. Lauren Arthur, (D-Kansas City).

A lack of educators been an ongoing struggle for years. It’s why the State Board of Education created a Blue Ribbon Commission to study recruitment and retention. 

“I think we’re going to see more teachers leaving if we don’t get them the support that they need now,” said Rep. Ingrid Burnett (D-Kansas City).

Last year, during the first phase, the commission’s report showed that increasing pay would help the state’s teacher shortage. Roughly 8,000 Missouri teachers make less than $35,000 a year according to the report. This year, there is money in the budget for school districts to pay all teachers at least $38,000, without putting any financial responsibility on the individual schools. 

Now that members are focused on the second phase, members are working to address climate and culture inside the classroom. 

“In talking with Missouri educators. They feel undervalued and under supported, particularly in terms of pay for experienced educators,” Deputy Director of K-12 from The Hunt Institute, Lucy Berrier Matheson told the committee Friday. “Teachers emphasized the importance of having a voice at the table. This includes opportunities for administrators to visit the classroom, actively listen to teachers’ perspectives and provide them with leadership and involve them in decision-making.”

For several hours Friday, members heard recommendations from The Hunt Institute and brainstormed about what can be done to keep teachers in the profession. 

“These are all societal issues. They come into the classroom and a change in society, we cannot expect our teachers to be totally normal and have a normal climate when the rest of the world and rest of the climate isn’t,” said Keith Pritchard, commission member and chairman of Security Bank of Pulaski County.

Burnett told the group; she believes there needs to be extra adults in the classroom. 

“I agree with you on the extra people, but we are facing a shortage right now,” said Margie Vandeven, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education Commissioner.. “We’re looking for people to fill positions that are still vacant and it’s July.”

One recommendation is to allow college junior and senior students pursuing a teaching degree to help teachers in the classroom. 

Assistant commissioner for the state’s education, Paul Katnik, said it’s not only teachers leaving the industry. 

“The turnover we’ve talked about at the teacher level is at the administrator level as well,” Katnik said. “I think we’ve seen higher numbers of superintendent turnover this year than we’ve seen before. We definitely know the retention rates of principals has dropped in the last year.”

Katnik told members that hundreds of teachers pursue an administrator certificate because it helps them to receive a pay raise, but they don’t use the certificate, which is why it’s a recommendation to create a master teaching certificate.  

“Because here in Missouri, we don’t have anything in between, you either are certified as a teacher or as an administrator and this one would fill the gap,” Katnik said. 

The Hunt Institute says research shows a review needs to be done on a program that pays teachers more for helping with extracurricular activities. 

“Educators support the Career Ladder program, but they often don’t have the necessary bandwidth to complete additional responsibilities to an already challenging workload,” Berrier Matheson said. 

Later this month, the Blue Ribbon Commission will vote on the recommendations, and then the plan is to present the report to the State Board of Education during their August meeting. 

Other recommendations the commission is considering include: 

Conduct an assessment to determine whether any local education agencies (LEAs) are currently utilizing an advanced teaching roles model

Review Career Ladder program statutes and regulations to ensure the program can support advanced teaching roles

Work with the legislature to establish grant funding for LEAs implementing ad advanced teaching role model 

Establish an annual evaluation and reporting process for LEAs that voluntarily adopt an advanced teaching roles model

Provide support at the Regional Professional Development Center level for district and school leaders who are implementing advanced teaching roles

Work with stakeholders to explore the possible creation of a master teaching certificate

Create uses or compensation for the master teaching certificate

Expand Missouri Leadership Development System (MLDS) to all principals and assistant principals statewide 

Use MLDS programming to further support principals’ work to develop a positive school climate and culture 

This summer, the state’s education department is also using federal COVID relief money to pay for certification tests for teachers to help combat the shortage of educators. 

Until the end of September, incoming and current teachers can register to take up to three certification test for free, with DESE picking up the tab. The goal is to help get more educators in the classroom in a state that is suffering a teacher shortage crisis. 

Now, the department is trying to entice teachers. DESE plans to spend $500,000 of federal COVID relief money to pay the fee associated with educator certification tests. 

Earlier this year, Katnik told the State Board of education, roughly 3,000 teachers are inappropriately certified. Inappropriately certified means an educator that is teaching in a content area that he or she doesn’t have the appropriate certificate for. 

According to the Teacher Workforce Report that Katnik provided to the State Board of Education in January, the content areas with the highest number of inappropriately certified teachers are in elementary education, followed by special education. 

Elementary Education 1-6: 523 full-time unqualified 

Mild/Moderate Cross Categorical K-12: 409 

Early Childhood Special Education B-3: 391

Early Childhood Education B-3: 372

Social Science 5-9: 281

Physics 9-12: 281

Mathematics 5-9: 234

Severely Developmentally Disabled B-12: 204

Biology 9-12: 199

General Sciences 5-9: 191