The Beloit School District has 89 open positions as the new school year approaches, and the shortage of educators in not something that is unique to Beloit.
Beloit School District’s executive director of human resources Dianelis “Didi” Almendares told the Daily News the vacant teaching positions include 24 openings at the middle school level and 17 openings at the high school level. All open positions can be seen at www.applitrack.com/sdb/onlineapp.
“Primarily our biggest deficits are with the teachers,” Almendares said. “Part of it is a lot of retirees and others who are leaving their teaching career and pursuing other interests. Some of it was fueled or accentuated by COVID and then you counter that with lower enrollment numbers for those pursuing education as a career and you get what we have right now across the nation.”
The district also is utilizing job fairs and other outlets in its recruitment efforts.
Almendares is hopeful that the district will be able to secure sufficient substitute staff and locate teaching talent to start off the beginning of the school year.
“We’re just eager to get some traction and some interest in our school district,” she said. “There’s a lot of positive growth that is slated for the district and we would love to be able to recruit individuals that can come to our district and grow with us and help serve the students in our community.”
Information from the National Education Association (NEA) indicates there is a teacher shortage across the nation brought on mostly by teacher burnout, stress from the COVID-19 pandemic and general low pay for teaching positions.
Also, fewer students are graduating from colleges and universities with education degrees. A recent NEA survey indicated 55% of educators planned to leave their profession earlier than expected due to stress from the pandemic.
