The obvious question: why are teachers leaving?
Jack Elsey, founding partner and CEO of the Michigan Educator Workforce Initiative, acknowledges it’s a difficult job and says traditional student teaching of around six weeks is no longer considered sufficient to prepare new teachers for the realities of the classroom such as difficult students, demanding parents, or teaching-to-the-test pressure.
“It leaves younger teachers, perhaps feeling increasingly isolated in the profession and so that calls upon both our efforts to retain our veteran teachers more because they can serve is that natural mentor down the hall and also calls upon our school systems to think more critically about the structures and systems they put in place to handle some of these challenges.”
Elsey says programs like Talent Together and My Early Apprentice offer year-long training programs.
“In a classroom, full-time, every day of the week, working under a mentor teacher, who is a strong veteran educator to ensure that a teacher candidate sees the whole arc of the school year.”
Elsey says another strategy being tested is team teaching, in which educators work together to serve a larger group of students while maintaining the same student-to-teacher ratio.
“So far the early data says the teachers are loving it. They feel less isolated in their profession. They see themselves in the profession longer term and they're frankly happy on the job.”
Elsey says retaining new teachers is critical as many older, veteran teachers are nearing retirement eligibility.
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Elsey says retaining new teachers is critical as many older, veteran teachers are nearing retirement eligibility
