Growing Their Own: Homegrown Solutions to Teacher Shortages

In 2016, the department of education at Mississippi State University-Meridian (MSU) faced a lack of students interested in majoring in elementary education. Nationally, shortages of elementary teachers are less common compared to other subject areas, with only 13 states and the District of Columbia reporting a shortage of elementary teachers in the 2017–18 school year.¹ At the same time, many districts in the state were dealing with acute teacher shortages and looking for new approaches to developing the teachers they so desperately needed.

MSU-Meridian turned to partnerships with local districts to recruit and prepare paraeducators to become licensed teachers. The idea was driven by research demonstrating that paraeducators have significant instructional experience, linguistic and cultural competence, connections to the communities where they work, and higher rates of retention once they become licensed teachers.²

Developed by former head of the Division of Education Susie Burroughs and now run by assistant professor Jeff Leffler, the Professional Advancement Network for Teacher Assistants (PANTA) program targets paraeducators who are near completing or already have an associate degree and aims to increase access to the elementary education program at MSU-Meridian. To that end, the admissions process is tailored to each individual student. Leffler and his colleagues review each applicant’s transcript and devise a personalized plan that outlines any prerequisites and testing requirements (including test prep courses) he or she needs to complete.

Courses are offered through a modified hybrid approach that uses both online and in-person meetings. Program faculty devised a system for helping students take four classes a semester but only requiring them to come to campus one evening a week. Leffler described this as a “stacking” process whereby two classes are offered at the same time but alternate between in-person and online meetings. “The first class meeting is split between the two classes so [instructors] can do their overview and then the classes alternate live meetings for the rest of the semester. We adjusted the schedule to where we could schedule a class from 4:00 to 6:30, and a second class from 6:45 to 9:15,” said Leffler. These modifications were necessary given that PANTA participants are working full time and have family obligations. In addition, many program participants can complete their field experience in the classrooms they are already working in.

Quitman County School District has also turned to Grow Your Own (GYO) programs, which recruit and prepare educators from the community who are invested in staying in the community. “Our GYO work arose out of desperation,” said Jossell.³ In 2016, in partnership with William Carey University, a private institution located in the southeastern part of the state, the district launched an alternate route program for individuals who already held a bachelor’s degree. The university was a natural partner given that it had experience running alternate route programs and experience working with districts across the state. Quitman’s prospective teachers enrolled in the university’s Art of Teaching program, which requires that participants take and pass two courses (Classroom Management and Tests, Measurements and Evaluation) before applying for an initial license. These two courses were offered locally over the summer so that teachers could begin working that fall while completing the rest of their coursework online. While the program does provide a fast track into the classroom, participants are required to eventually pass required licensure exams; the district offers mentoring and support to help ensure teachers are able to do so.

PANTA and the program in Quitman County are just two examples of how Grow Your Own programs are being leveraged in Mississippi to ease teacher shortages. While GYO programs like PANTA and the Art of Teaching are local initiatives, the state is working to boost these efforts.⁴

Last year, the Mississippi Department of Education launched a GYO task force composed of stakeholders representing school districts, higher education, philanthropy, and business. As task force member Ben Burnett, dean of the School of Education at William Carey University, said, “our charge was to just ignite the idea and to start that culture throughout the state because it's going to take years for these ideas to come to practice.”⁵ These ideas culminated in a report that outlined key policy issues and solutions for how GYO could expand throughout the state.⁶

The task force offered recommendations for promoting GYO in three areas: high school teacher academies, paraeducator and classified staff pathways, and community colleges and postsecondary institutions. Previously, high school pathways were hampered by strict regulations on the credentials necessary to teach these courses but the MDE is currently proposing alternatives based on educator experience so that these programs might be implemented widely. The task force recommended that licensure regulations be amended and that Teacher Academies be designed to offer two pathways, one through career and technical education, where students can earn the credentials necessary to work in child care centers or as paraeducators; and another that would allow students to earn college credit via dual enrollment. Recommendations for tuition assistance and program flexibility in educator preparation programs would allow paraeducators to continue working while earning their teaching degrees. The task force recommended differential tuition rates for education majors and articulation agreements between Teacher Academy programs, community colleges, and education preparation programs to increase resources for programs and activities aiming to address teacher shortages.

What remains to be seen is whether these recommendations will be embraced by state lawmakers. In the 2019 legislative session, 19 teacher shortage bills were introduced and none of them passed,⁷ although the state did increase teacher pay by $1,500 and allocate $500,000 for forgivable loans for teachers working in shortage districts. This year, a bill to give teachers a $1,000 raise was passed out of committee in the senate and forwarded on to the house, but ended up not getting any traction.⁸ Similarly, a bill that would have revised the admissions requirements for educator preparation programs to help increase access also failed to get passed.⁹

Meanwhile, school districts like Quitman are not waiting for state lawmakers to act. They are using local and federal funds to develop strategies and approaches to recruiting, preparing, and ultimately retaining homegrown teachers.

For Jossell, the district’s investment in GYO is helping to create more continuity for students who have seen teachers come and go every couple of years by providing a pathway into the profession for teachers who are invested in staying there. Indeed, a handful of studies suggest that teachers prepared through GYO have higher rates of retention.¹⁰ She is also hopeful that these homegrown teachers will help the district sustain its upward momentum. Since 2016 its rating in the state accountability system has gone from an F to a C, with one school being rated as an A. “Teachers who came through GYO have bought into the vision,” she said.¹¹