With the 2024-25 school year beginning, K-12 students across the state of Texas are being introduced to a slew of new faces as many of their teachers from previous years have left the state or the profession altogether.
Research from the University of Houston’s College of Education – titled the “2024 Texas Teacher Workforce Report” – found that over the last decade, overall teacher retention has been trending down, decreasing roughly 6.4 percentage points between the 2012-13 and the 2021-22 school years.
According to the UH findings, the post-pandemic reality has placed several hurdles before teachers that many veteran educators are not willing to clear. These include getting paid less while being instructed to teach more subjects. In HISD, reasons for the mass teacher exodus included a lack of trust in Superintendent Mike Miles, district-produced curriculums, a hostile work environment, and ever-changing metrics for teacher and principal evaluation.
That means an influx, not only in HISD but across the state, of teachers entering the classroom with no prior experience or training.
Impact on Black Students
And in Texas, as it is nationally, schools with predominantly Black and Brown populations bear the brunt of this reality. On average, schools with higher percentages of Black students have 8% first-year teachers, while schools with lower percentages of Black students have 5%.
Black teachers are also more likely to be new to the classroom than all teachers. In 2022, 18% of Black teachers had been teaching for less than four years, compared to 14% of all teachers.
That reality has its good and bad points. Less experienced teachers usually mean students are exposed to less experienced and nuanced instruction. However, traditionally, white teachers in public schools in Texas and the nation make up roughly 80% of teachers (Blacks, 7%). And research. And with research showing Black students do better academically, behaviorally, scholarship-wise, attendance-wise, etc. when they have Black teachers, new teachers, if Black, may produce a net positive gain.
Still, Toni Templeton, senior research science at the University of Houston Education Research Center, says the large turnover from experienced to new and inexperienced teachers could be detrimental to the growth of Texas students.
“We have seen trends that those who are uncertified leave the classroom at higher rates. It’s creating this circular problem.” Templeton said. “As far as the students are concerned, we are unsure that teachers who are uncertified come to the classroom with a specific set of skills they need to best support students.”
Strategies to Tackle Teacher Shortage
The UH report notes one of the strategies Texas has taken to tackle teacher shortages is to increase the number of pathways prospective teachers can take to get certified.
Individuals can be awarded a certification based on vocational experience and a Grow Your Own teacher certification program, which allows school districts to build teacher pipelines from within their respective communities, according to the Texas Education Agency.
“The combination of these changes has resulted in a teacher population with a wide variety of preparation experiences prior to entering the classroom,” according to the report.
To put that into perspective, 89.8% of public school teachers held a standard teaching certificate during the 2012-13 school year, according to the report. That percentage decreased to 83.2% during the 2022-23 school year while the percentage of uncertified teachers increased 6.7% – from 7.8% to 14.5%.
“We’re worried that not only is the increasing number of uncertified teachers going to create a school environment that’s not as supportive of students as it could be, but it’s going to compound the problem of teacher shortages because they’re not well-prepared to be a teacher,” Templeton said.
Teaching Two or More Subjects
Not only do fewer teachers have standard certifications, they also may be responsible for more than one subject. The report shows that the number of educators overseeing at least two subjects has steadily increased across a decade, with small dips here and there.
Houston-area activist Shavon Johnston attributes this to the nation’s economic model.
“In a capitalist society, it only makes sense for those in power to squeeze out the most work from workers while paying them the least amount of money,” said Johnston. “I’m amazed schools wholesale across the nation haven’t resorted to this – teachers teaching multiple subjects – sooner. It cuts costs; instruction quality be damned.”
During the 2012-13 school year, 75,282 teachers taught two subjects; a decade later, that number jumped to 87,477 – an increase of 16%.
The number of teachers responsible for three subjects also rose, from 23,536 in the 2012-13 school year to 27,275 in the 2022-23 school year.
“Teaching more subjects contributes to a stressful working environment – asking more of teaching without increasing pay does not entice educators to stay in the field,” Templeton said.
Teacher Pay
Echoing Templeton’s point, the report shows those increased responsibilities do not appear to come with a larger paycheck.
In fact, the report shows that the average pay for a Texas teacher during the 2012-13 school year decreased across the decade from $64,638 to $61,336 during the 2022-23 school year. Teachers saw the greatest average pay during the 2019-20 school year at $68,030.
“While we know that pay is not the only reason that teachers leave or would avoid entering the field, we know that it becomes really troublesome and doesn’t contribute to interest or prestige in the field,” Templeton said.
Reforms/Solutions
Despite these challenges, the report suggests two reform policies that could ensure student success.
The first is to restore teacher certification requirements and increase university-based teacher preparation programs.
The second is to invest in public school finance equalization, address teacher pay scales, and oppose policies that direct tax-payer dollars outside of the public school system.
“The 2024 Texas Teacher Workforce Report offers evidence to support establishing prestige in the teaching profession through strong teacher preparation and certification programs, as well as equity-based finance reforms,” Templeton said.
