Topic: Teacher Workforce Policy

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State Education Human Capital Roundtables

Education human capital roundtables in several states are having challenging conversations on how to improve the quality of their teaching workforce through targeted recruitment, preparation, retention and professional growth strategies. To support them, SREB: 

  • tracks policies, actions and research across the continuum to help policymakers with decisions 
  • convenes leaders to examine promising policies and decide together what will work in their own states
  • provides assistance with planning as states put policies into action
Blog post Megan Boren, Program Specialist, SREBBlog Post

Respect (and Pay) Our Teachers, Or Lose Them

teacher overseeing student work in library As state education budgets suffer during this pandemic, the teaching profession simply cannot absorb the kind of blow it took in the last recession. Teacher salaries dropped substantially then, and today, a decade later, they’re still lower on average than before the Great Recession. Morale has dropped, too, according to surveys, and turnover has risen as budgets and teacher supports decrease. We can’t afford to repeat the same mistakes in this current climate, another recession aggravated by COVID-19.

Blog post Megan Boren, Program Specialist, SREB

COVID-19 Effects on the Teacher Workforce

In April, my mom called me with the news that my high school chemistry teacher, Mr. Metcalfe, who was rounding out his 42nd year of teaching, had died from COVID-19. I knew him from class, of course, but I also went to school with his son for 13 years and his family attended my grandparent’s church.

He was respected, loved and honored for his excellent teaching. His funeral was an all-day parade of cars through the high school parking lot, where community members waved and shouted condolences to his family. My mom said the cars stretched down the street for miles.