OHE Offices

What does the data on teacher supply and demand reveal about teacher shortages? What strategies should be used to eliminate those shortages and ensure that all students have qualified teachers?

Reason for Consideration

For information.

Proposed Handling

This item will come before the Board of Regents at its May 2006 meeting for discussion.

Procedural History

The Regents have discussed specific elements of teacher supply and demand data at several previous Board meetings. This follow-up information was requested by members of the Board.

Background Information

At its June 2005 meeting, the Board of Regents adopted the Statewide Plan for Higher Education, 2004-2012. Within that Plan, the Regents identified thirteen key priorities for the higher education system in New York State. One of the priorities is to ensure an adequate supply of qualified teachers, school leaders, and other school professionals. This priority is consistent with the Regents 1998 Teaching Policy, Teaching to Higher Standards: New York’s Commitment, which identified critical gaps related to New York State’s teaching workforce and recommended strategies for closing those gaps.

This priority is also consistent with the Department’s plan for the use of federal funds, under Title II of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB), to ensure that (1) all children are taught core academic subjects by teachers who are "highly qualified" and (2) that low income and minority children have teachers who are as qualified as other children. To be "highly qualified" for a teaching assignment in a core subject, a teacher must have a bachelor’s degree, meet State certification requirements for the assignment and demonstrate subject matter competency for the core subject (by having completed a major or equivalent coursework in the subject, passing a certification examination in the subject or other options). In 2004-2005, 93 percent of New York classes in core academic subjects were taught by teachers who met the "highly qualified" definition. However, there was a 16 to 17 point difference between high poverty schools and low poverty schools.

Consistent with these policies, this report provides an overview of teacher shortages in New York State’s public schools by subject area. It is based upon the Department’s public school workforce and teacher certification data through the end of school year 2004-2005 and preliminary data provided by the New York City Department of Education for school year 2005-2006. The report:

The report shows that in 2004-2005, the most recent completed school year, the Big Five Cities had high percentages of full-time equivalent (FTE) assignments held by teachers who were not certified in the subjects in which they were providing instruction. These assignments were due to shortages and administrative decisions (i.e., scheduling conflicts, district policies, etc.), and many were approved "incidental" teaching, which is permitted by the Regulations of the Commissioner. For example, in 2004-2005 in New York City, individuals without appropriate certification had at least 30 percent of FTE assignments in career and technical education, English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and bilingual education, library/school media specialist and reading/literacy and between 21 and 30 percent of FTE assignments in English, languages other than English (LOTE) and the sciences. Similar shortages existed in other high poverty districts in 2004-2005.

Recommendation

N/A

Timetable for Implementation

N/A

The Need for Certified Teachers in New York State (PowerPoint Presentation)

The Need for Certified Teachers in New York State (PDF of PowerPoint Presentation)

Teacher quality is an essential element of the New York State Board of Regents and federal government’s strategy to raise student achievement, close achievement gaps and improve high school graduation rates. The Regents require all public school classes to be taught by appropriately certified teachers. (For example: In 2000-2001, there were as many as 13,000 temporarily licensed teachers in New York State. In 2003, the Regents changed the regulations to eliminate the use of temporarily licensed teachers in all but the hardest to staff subjects. A limited number of modified temporary licenses for those subjects were authorized by the Regents for the 2003-2004 and 2004-2005 school years only. All temporary licenses were eliminated after the 2004-2005 school year.) In addition, federal laws require all public school classes in core academic subjects be taught by teachers who are certified and meet the federal definition of "highly qualified."

Since we last reported to the Board on progress in implementing the Regents Teaching Policy, much work has been done at many levels to increase the number of certified teachers in specific subjects in New York State. For example:

• Colleges and universities with teacher education programs are working with school districts to identify teacher shortage areas so that they can advise potential teaching students about job availabilities and make program adjustments as needed.

• School districts are creating incentive programs to encourage newly certified and experienced teachers to apply for jobs in shortage areas.

• The State Education Department has implemented the use of multiple pathways to certification, created by the Board of Regents, so that more career changers and other qualified individuals can enter the teaching profession.

• The Department has provided technical assistance and resources to help teacher education programs and school districts recruit and retain qualified teachers.

• The Department has established a new on-line teacher certification system (TEACH) to certify qualified teacher candidates as quickly as possible.

• Working with the teacher certification examination vendor, National Evaluation Systems (NES), the Department has doubled the number of opportunities for teacher candidates to take certification examinations.

The Department has made significant progress in ensuring that all students have appropriately certified teachers, but challenges remain. It is critical for us to have accurate data and useful indicators of teacher supply and demand to measure progress and reach our goals.

Statewide data on the teaching workforce are collected through the annual Basic Education Data System (BEDS). Data analysis for the 2005-2006 school year will not be available before the fall of 2006. The most current statewide data available are for the 2004-

2005 school year. Even though the data are for the latest completed school year, and not the current year, they provide indicators that can be helpful to the Regents and other policymakers as they continue to develop strategies to address teacher shortages. We have included preliminary data for school year 2005-2006 provided by the New York City Department of Education but, because the City’s data is calculated differently than the BEDS data is calculated, it is presented in a separate table (Table 3).

Since 2000, the Board of Regents and the State Education Department, with support from the Governor and Legislature, have been implementing policies to ensure that all students have appropriately certified teachers to assist them in meeting State Learning Standards. Highlights are listed below.

The implementation of the Regents policies has had a real impact on the teaching workforce and has helped New York State make progress toward ensuring that every public school educator is appropriately certified for each assignment. In addition, colleges and universities with teacher education programs have made efforts to increase the number of individuals who complete teacher education programs, with some success. The number of teacher education program completers, who are potential candidates for certification through the College Recommended pathway to certification, has risen in recent years, from 18,600 in 2000-2001 to a peak of 24,100 in 2003-2004 and then to 20,800 in 2004-2005.

In addition, in 2004-2005, 8 percent of full-time equivalent (FTE) assignments in New York State’s public schools were held by individuals without appropriate certification, down from 13 percent in 2000-2001.

Retirements. Retirements will continue to create teaching vacancies in New York State as the 125,000 baby-boomers who were age 45 or more in 2004-2005 (nearly half of the public school workforce), retire during the next two decades. In 2004-2005, nearly one-fifth of the public school workforce was over age 55.

Distribution of certified and "highly qualified" teachers. Federal law requires us to close the gaps in teacher qualifications between high poverty and low poverty schools. As of school year 2004-2005, 93 percent of all classes in core academic subjects in New York State were taught by teachers who were certified and "highly qualified" but there was a gap between high poverty and low poverty schools, as shown in Table 1. (See Table 3 for preliminary data suggesting that the gap was closed significantly during school year 2005-2006 in New York City, where the majority of schools are classified as high poverty.)

Table 2 compares subjects with possible shortages in 2004-2005 in New York City, the Big Four Cities and the Rest of State excluding the Big Four Cities. New York City and the Big Four Cities are high need districts while the Rest of State excluding the Big Four Cities has a more diverse mix of districts, including some high need districts. The pattern in Table 2 is clear. In 2004-2005, high need districts were less likely than other districts to have appropriately certified teachers.

Appendix A provides more detail by showing the number of FTE assignments held by individuals without appropriate certification in each region of the State.

Tables 4 and 5 show supply and demand indicators of shortages by comparing the number of certificates issued to new teachers to the number of vacancies historically filled by new teachers in each subject area. To illustrate this indicator, consider this example: If New York State issued 100 certificates in secondary English to new teachers (who had no certificate in a prior year) and there were 100 FTE assignments in secondary English filled by new teachers (i.e., vacancies) there would be 1.0 certificate per vacancy. If 200 certificates had been issued for the 100 vacancies, there would be 2.0 certificates per vacancy. If 50 certificates had been issued for the 100 vacancies, there would have been 0.5 certificates per vacancy. The data in Tables 4 and 5 are based on a four-year average of certificates and vacancies to adjust for the large number of certificates issued in 2003-2004 when many candidates rushed to become certified before new certificate titles took effect in February 2004. Vacancies for new teachers are equal to the number of FTE assignments held by teachers in their first year of experience in any district. In both Tables 4 and 5, we define:

• severe shortages as only one or fewer certificates issued per vacancy;

• shortages as from 1.1 to 1.5 certificates per vacancy (because some newly certified individuals receive more than one certificate, making fewer individuals available to fill vacancies than certificates issued);

• possible balances of supply and demand as 1.6 to 3.0 certificates per vacancy, provided that all newly certified individuals actually fill available vacancies, which is not the case; and

• possible surpluses as 3.0 certificates per vacancy, provided that all newly certified individuals actually fill available vacancies, which is not the case.

Table 4 includes all three traditional and alternative pathways to certification.

1. The college-recommended pathway includes graduates of teacher preparation programs and students in alternate route programs who can serve as teachers of record with transitional or internship certificates while completing their programs.
    

2. The transcript evaluation pathway and its successor, the individual evaluation pathway, permits candidates to meet all certification requirements without completing a teacher education program. This option is scheduled to end by February 2009.
    

3. The interstate reciprocity pathway permits candidates to qualify for a conditional certificate in New York based on certification in a reciprocity state.

Table 4 shows that, with all pathways to certification, New York City had severe shortages in four subjects (Career and Technical Education, Math, Physical Education and Reading and Literacy) and shortages in three subjects (English, Sciences and Social Studies).

Table 4 also shows that, with all pathways to certification, the Rest of State’s only shortage area would have been Reading and Literacy, if all newly certified individuals in all other subjects were willing and able to work where they were needed. Three subjects would have had surpluses if every newly certified individual were willing to fill a public school vacancy in New York State. In Elementary and Early Childhood education, the Rest of State had 5.7 certificates per vacancy. Regional shortages vary within the Rest of State and are shown in Appendix A.

Table 5 shows that there would not have been enough completers of college teacher preparation programs and students in alternate route programs to meet the total demand for newly certified educators both in New York City and the Rest of State.

The individual evaluation pathway is scheduled to end for Childhood Education in February 2007 and for all other teaching certificate titles in February 2009. Table 5 shows that it would be difficult to meet public school demand for teachers if the Regents were to end this pathway as planned – unless there were large increases in the number of College Recommended certificates issued during the next few years.

Many steps have been taken to eliminate shortages of certified teachers in New York State. The Regents and the State Education Department have implemented initiatives to help school districts recruit and retain qualified teachers. Colleges and universities with teacher education programs are working closely with area school districts to identify shortage areas and should encourage teacher education students to work toward certification in those subjects. School districts, most notably, the New York City Department of Education, have taken steps to align teachers’ qualifications and assignments and to implement effective recruitment and retention strategies. The data in this report show that, while all of these efforts are improving the situation, more work is still needed. The success of many of the next steps outlined above will depend, at least partly, upon the collection and reporting of accurate and timely data on teacher supply and demand. The State Education Department will continue to work with colleges and universities and school districts to collect and report data that will be useful in the development and implementation of strategies to eliminate shortages of certified teachers.