School districts face a daunting shortage of teachers, employees

Jun. 25—While school districts in Lewiston and Moscow have plenty of job openings, it's not as many as other districts in Idaho.

According to Idaho Education News, a survey from the Idaho State Board of Education showed at least 700 public school teacher vacancies. Although the Lewiston School District has several openings, it's not as significant as other districts, Superintendent Lance Hansen said areas in the Magic Valley have 200 openings.

However, there are fewer people applying for jobs. Last year, there were 70 applications to teach at the elementary level — this year, there are 40, Hansen said.

Moscow Superintendent Greg Bailey said the elementary positions aren't seeing as many applications as they used to in Moscow as well. Paraprofessionals, like classroom aides, bus drivers and custodians are currently the most difficult positions to fill because the school district is competing against other companies.

"We're having to work a lot harder to fill those positions," Bailey said.

Hansen said the areas of most need are in math, science and special education at the secondary level in the Lewiston School District. The high school's career and technical education program also provides opportunities for more specialty areas that can appeal to people, but also create a limited candidate pool.

Hansen and Bailey said teachers retiring is one of the causes for the number of openings. Hansen said the shortage has been predicted for a while because more people are retiring and there are less people entering education, which is creating more openings than available candidates. Bailey also said some teachers left the education field during the pandemic.

Although living close to the Washington border, which pays more for teachers, does cause some Lewiston and Moscow teachers to seek employment in Clarkston, Pullman and Asotin, it's not being done in large numbers. When people do leave the district, it's more likely because they are retiring, leaving the education field or moving to a different location because of family reasons, like their spouse got a job somewhere else, Bailey said.

"It's really hard when you got the kids expecting to have a teacher," Bailey said. "We have to make sure we have the best and the brightest in front of them teaching them."

Both Hansen and Bailey noted that having colleges nearby, like Lewis-Clark State College, the University of Idaho and Washington State University, provides teachers in those programs the opportunity to teach in Lewiston and Moscow school districts. Hansen said it helps the district get quality candidates who know the area and school district because teachers are doing their practicums in the district and want to stay.

Both the Lewiston and Moscow school districts have made changes to recruit teachers. Hansen said the school board changed its policy for newly hired veteran teachers to be recognized for all their years of teaching, which allows them to be on a higher salary bracket. Bailey said the Moscow School District provided incentives for people to get others to apply for a job and paid for employees' assessment tests. The district also increased the pay for paraprofessionals to make the job more competitive.

"Education is an amazing profession," Hansen said. "Anybody who's looking to go into that profession (will find) it's extremely rewarding."

Brewster may be contacted at kbrewster@lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2297.