The data are clear: Public schools in the United States are facing a teacher shortage that is projected to grow during the next 10 years. Educators and community members have cause for concern about who will teach U.S. children. One solution may be to recruit and train individuals in other professional fields who are interested in becoming teachers.
Schools in the United States will need to hire 200,000 K–12 teachers annually during the next decade to address rising student enrollments and accelerating teacher retirements. More than one-third of the current teaching force has more than 20 years of service (Fideler & Haselkorn, 1999). Attrition rates will rise as more teachers become eligible to retire. In addition, those teachers will be replaced by younger teachers with little experience, who also have high attrition rates (Grissmer, 2000). Nationwide, more than one-fifth of classroom teachers in U.S. public schools leave their positions within three years; 9 percent leave before completing their first year of public school teaching (National Center for Education Statistics, 1997). Authorities have estimated teacher attrition rates in the first five years to be between 30 and 50 percent (Darling-Hammond & Sclan, 1996).
In the past, school administrators have recruited from the pool of former teachers returning to the profession. In fact, former teachers returning to teaching used to constitute more than 50 percent of teachers hired every year, but this proportion has been declining. In addition, the job market for college graduates today is strong and job alternatives to teaching are plentiful (Grissmer, 2000). Even if college students could be enticed into teaching, traditional university-based undergraduate programs are unlikely to be able to meet the demand for new teachers unless extensive funding is provided to expand these programs (Switzer, 2000). For example, 150,000 teachers are prepared annually, but the number of annual teacher vacancies is 200,000—and nearly 18 percent of all candidates who are prepared to teach never enter the profession (Kotterman, 2000).
A Second Career
As the teacher shortage worsens, substantial federal and state resources are being channeled into teacher recruitment and preparation efforts. Since 1999, for example, the Title II Teacher Quality Enhancement Program has awarded $98 million to 32 state departments of education, 33 partnerships involving teacher preparation institutions, and 27 individual teacher recruitment projects to support efforts to increase teacher supply and quality (U.S. Department of Education, 2000). Most of the projects emphasize attracting minority teacher candidates as well as candidates in such high-demand teaching fields as math, science, foreign languages, and bilingual and special education. Collectively, these projects attempt to attract new persons into teaching from such pools as secondary students, college undergraduates, paraprofessionals, and individuals interested in making a career change.
Career changers and retirees who are transitioning into teaching will be the first to emerge from these programs, and school administrators can expect to see increasing numbers of these candidates soon. First and foremost, school administrators should acknowledge that the teacher shortage is not likely to be solved without these candidates. The baby boom generation is a large, untapped population of potential teachers—77 million people who were born between the years of 1946 and 1964 and who make up 31 percent of the U.S. population (Cork & Lightstone, 1998). A substantial number of baby boomers are interested in changing careers to engage in more meaningful work. But their number and potential interest in teaching are not the only factors that make this pool promising: Because many baby boomers already hold college degrees, they can be prepared to enter teaching more quickly than younger recruits.
Midcareer individuals bring many strengths to teaching, including maturity, life experience, and good work habits. Among the teacher candidates with whom we have worked are a biological researcher, an analytical chemist, a paralegal assistant, a technical writer, an editor, a juvenile probation officer, a sales representative, a television producer, a cruise ship officer, and a professional musician, as well as numerous attorneys, engineers, and computer executives. These midcareer candidates bring authentic examples from past experience to enrich their teaching. They give real-world answers to the age-old student question, Why do we have to learn this? In addition to depth and breadth of content knowledge, research shows that teachers entering the field at an older age have lower attrition rates than those entering teaching at a younger age (Grissmer, 2000).
In the past, these second-career teachers have mostly been products of alternative certification programs in which candidates are employed as teachers before earning an initial teaching certificate. A new type of program is emerging, however, as a result of the newly available resources—intensive, accelerated, field-based programs that culminate in initial certification before the individual is employed as a teacher.
The Teacher Recruitment and Induction Project
One such program is the Teacher Recruitment and Induction Project (TRIP). The project—a collaborative endeavor of the Southwest Texas State University College of Education, Science, and Liberal Arts, and seven school districts—was designed specifically for midcareer adults and was funded in 1999 by a grant from the Teacher Quality Enhancement Program.
The partnership recruits talented individuals who already have bachelor's degrees, provides them with high-quality preparation, facilitates their employment in high-needs schools, and offers them intensive induction support during their first two years of teaching. This approach allows participants who want to switch careers to complete initial certification requirements in an accelerated time frame of one year or less before they are employed as teachers.
Because participants in the program complete initial certification prior to employment, the program is an alternative pathway into teaching, but not an alternative certification program. The program encompasses strong content preparation and rigorous curriculum in pedagogy, including such areas as human growth and development, principles of teaching and learning, classroom management, instructional strategies, curriculum development, content integration, assessment of student learning, technology applications, and content pedagogy.
A team of six field-based faculty members from the college of education and a content support team of four arts and sciences faculty members representing math, science, language arts, and social studies teach in the program. During the first semester, participants are enrolled for 15 hours of graduate education coursework. Courses are integrated to provide the greatest coverage of essential pedagogical concepts in the most efficient manner (Brooks & Brooks, 1999; O'Neil & Willis, 1998; Williams, 1996). Instructors model best practices through the use of interactive cooperative learning, project-based learning, book clubs, and authentic assessments (Clay, Cohen, Ligons, & Roff, 1998; Daniels, 1994; Gardner, 1983, 1995). Technology is integrated as a collaborative tool for learning (Diem, Martinez, & Perez, 1998; Ebenezer & Lau, 1999).
In addition to a full day of classes, first-semester participants spend two days a week in a high-needs elementary or secondary school. In these supervised, field-based blocks of integrated graduate coursework, students spend half of each day observing, tutoring, and teaching students and the other half in class with professors who integrate their instruction and assignments with the students' classroom experiences. Participants receive immediate feedback on their teaching from their professors, students, and cooperating teachers.
During the second semester of the program, participants work full time as student teachers and take a graduate course one afternoon each week. The teachers preparing to teach in elementary schools receive instruction in science and math methods, and those preparing to teach in secondary schools take a problem-based course that addresses such topics as legal and ethical issues, school safety and management strategies, nonviolence and community-building curriculums, diversity issues, and practical classroom management. Full-time mentors provide weekly support, which helps foster the strong relationships necessary for the subsequent two years of induction into teaching.
When asked to reflect on the elements of the program they particularly valued, most participants talked about the supervised field experiences in the high-needs schools, the positive influence of the mentor, the peer-group support, and the accelerated curriculum. When asked if they thought they had made the right choice in selecting this pre-employment preparation program rather than an alternative certification program, their answers were positive. One participant wrote:I appreciated the academic support as well as the continuing relationship with a mentor. I don't think the short period of training given in alternative certification programs would be sufficient to familiarize potential teachers with the student and administrative cultures that they need to deal with.A former attorney wrote:I chose TRIP because I wanted a deeper background in pedagogy. I'm glad I did, and I would choose TRIP again because teaching is not as easy as it looks. . . . and it doesn't even look easy.
Special Challenges
Despite the many good qualities that well-prepared, second-career teachers offer, they also bring some special challenges for school administrators. Second-career adults are assertive and determined. Our surveys, interviews, focus group data, and observations of students in the Teacher Recruitment and Induction Project suggest that these individuals are not easily persuaded that inadequate service to students can be rationalized by scarce public school resources. They insist upon school-based assistance formats in which colleagues and administrators discuss instructional and school reform issues. They expect teaching colleagues and administrators to act as sounding boards for problem solving and to provide constructive criticism, mentoring and moral support, in-class assistance, and peer coaching. They expect collegial, administrative, and parental support in difficult situations.
Although many midcareer changers have extensive experience working in bureaucracies, they have limited patience with bureaucratic procedures and paperwork that they perceive as barriers to their work with students. Midcareer individuals understand the realities of the workplace within the global economy and want to do their best to prepare students to be successful adults. Career changers, often having come from highly competitive work environments, believe that strong collegial and administrative support is crucial to their successful induction into teaching. Administrators who want docile teachers who won't make waves may not be prepared for the assertive, resourceful, and vocal second-career teacher. Those administrators who appreciate the skill, wisdom, resourcefulness, and determination of the career changers who have come through high-quality teacher preparation programs will find strong teachers committed to student learning.
Recognizing Quality
The rapid growth of new programs to attract midcareer adults into the teaching profession poses additional challenges for school administrators, who, although familiar with the products of traditional teacher preparation programs, may have limited experience in evaluating the credentials of teachers prepared in mid-career programs. Administrators should understand the unique characteristics of this new pool of teachers and should be able to recognize the components of high-quality accelerated teacher preparation programs.
- Strong content preparation aligned with state and national standards.
- Rigorous curriculum in human growth and development, principles of teaching and learning, classroom management, instructional strategies, curriculum development and integration, assessment of student learning, technology applications, and content pedagogy.
- Substantial amounts of structured fieldwork and intensive clinical experiences.
- Support from peers and mentors throughout the induction period.
These characteristics are not always easy to address within an accelerated second-career program, so the astute administrator should gather such information about the applicant's preparation program. Qualitative differences do exist among preparation programs, and it is in the administrator's best interest to know the breadth and depth of the applicant's preparation.
Second-career teachers can help alleviate the teaching shortage and can bring strengths that will benefit schools and students. Such teachers have always brought commitment, maturity, and life experience to teaching. Now, comprehensive, accelerated teacher preparation programs offer strong content preparation, substantial field-based work in schools, and pedagogy for teaching today's students. Wise principals will look closely for these preparation components when selecting second-career teachers.
