teacher shortage

With more school districts in Missouri and Kansas adopting a four-day school week, educators and parents are grappling with a question that isn’t easy to answer: What trade-offs come with a shortened school week, and are those trade-offs worth it? It depends who you ask.

School districts in the Kansas City area are holding hiring fairs and offering incentives for hard-to-fill roles before students head back to school next month.

A new report shows Missouri's teacher retention slightly improved after the pandemic drove more educators out of the field, but is still at record highs.

Overwork, underpay, student behaviors and a lack of administrative support were the top reasons for leaving the field, according to a recent survey of mostly Missouri teachers.

As the ongoing teacher shortage persists, school districts like Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools are using virtual teachers to get by. The number of students learning from remote, on-screen instructors has more than doubled, despite the move being intended as a stopgap.

Missouri Department of Secondary and Elementary Education officials said the data signals a turning point in a teacher shortage the state has struggled to address in recent years.

The Independence School District transitioned to a four-day week with the hope to attract and retain more teachers. Applications skyrocketed after it made the switch, but a new Missouri law may do away with the shortened schedule.

The budget approved by Missouri lawmakers for the fiscal year that begins July 1 is $1 billion less than the current year’s appropriation. It might not cover all the costs of a wide-ranging new education law signed by Gov. Mike Parson.

The bill would boost minimum teacher salaries from $25,000 to $40,000 a year. It also greatly expands Missouri's tax-credit scholarship program for K-12 students to attend private schools.

A bill headed to the Missouri governor's desk would require larger school districts to receive voter approval before adopting a four-day week. That includes the Independence School District, which switched to a four-day week this school year to attract more teachers.

A wide-ranging bill in the Missouri legislature includes provisions to address the state's struggle to recruit and retain teachers, but also includes controversial school choice measures.

The annual state budget and a tax that funds the bulk of Missouri’s Medicaid program are two things that must pass this session. And before the break, senators passed a major education bill that included priorities for both Republicans and Democrats.