The pandemic and its aftermath have taken a terrible toll on the teaching profession across the country, and Missouri is no exception to the rule. That’s why the state last year set up a Blue Ribbon Commission to figure out how to attract and retain teachers. The commission meets again this week in its quest to figure out how to create a better climate and culture for the state’s educators.
It’s a worthy goal. Our recommendation: more carrots, fewer sticks.
Missouri teachers could certainly use a few carrots. It’s long been known that the state’s teacher salaries are among the lowest in the nation. “Missouri educators feel undervalued and under-supported,” the commission reported in a “Key Takeaways” document from its May meeting. Part of the problem is pay: “The rising cost of inflation hinders their ability to pay for daily living expenses.”
We hope the shortfall will be remedied by the budget bill currently sitting on Gov. Mike Parson’s desk. The bill includes funding to raise baseline teacher salaries to $38,000 a year.
That’s a good start, but it’s not enough.
For many teachers in many of the state’s schools, classroom climate and overwork are also issues. “Insufficient staffing and the lack of resources can result in overcrowded classrooms, limited access to materials and technology, and increased administrative tasks that take away from instructional time and infringe on their own family time,” the commission reported.
Being a teacher — in Missouri and elsewhere — is often hard, stressful work.
So we are concerned by reports that Missouri school districts are increasingly attempting to use punitive measures against teachers who decide, for whatever reason, that they’re not up to the demands of the job.
The Springfield News-Leader reported that some districts are imposing penalties of up to $10,000 for educators who withdraw from the classroom before the end of their contracts. In a few cases, the districts have even sought to suspend the teaching licenses of those who leave early. There were a record 11 such cases in the last year, the paper reported.
Three of those cases went before the State Board of Education last week. Two resulted in suspensions. One did not. And that last case demonstrates why the issue is so fraught.
The educator in question was hired before the 2022-23 school year to teach Spanish in middle school and high school in the Hancock Place School District in St. Louis. She quit just a few weeks into the term, though, apparently overwhelmed.
The teacher “was having behavior difficulties with students,” the state reported. “She felt like it was a hostile work environment. She was physically threatened by students on numerous occasions.” And she would “often break down in class.” The teacher left the Hancock Place district, but not the profession — turning instead to substitute teaching to pay her bills.
That left the district in a lurch. Without a teacher, the district’s middle school students were shunted to non-Spanish classes. High school students were forced into virtual classes to complete their Spanish education. “They are teaching themselves, essentially,” the district superintendent testified.
It’s a bad deal all around.
Students and districts deserve and need to have teachers in classrooms. It’s not clear, though, what purpose would have been served by punishing a teacher unable to cope with classroom demands — or how those punishments entice other discouraged Missouri teachers to stick with the job.
“Those actions don’t support all the work for recruitment and retention by policymakers and advocates — people around the country — to support greater involvement and increased interest in going into the education field,” said Matt Michelson, director of policy for the Missouri State Teachers Association.
We agree. The Blue Ribbon Commission has already done a lot of work to improve the teaching environment in Missouri. A lot of work remains. The state and its teachers will be better off if the focus is on carrots, not sticks.
