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By: Emily Scott
Pennsylvania’s substitute-teacher shortage has put a lot of pressure on educators in the state, but a new law signed by Gov. Tom Wolf last week aims to expand the pool of eligible substitutes.
Under House Bill 412, retired teachers now can fill vacancies on an emergency or short-term basis. Public schools also can use some college students and recent graduates of an education program as substitutes.
Rich Askey, president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association, said the shortage has a ripple effect on students’ ability to learn. Nearly two years into the pandemic, he emphasized it is critical to ensure they stay on track.
“This law is going to help achieve that by reducing the number of overcrowded classrooms,” Askey explained. “The educators are now telling me they don’t have time in the middle of their day to take a bathroom break. They’re teaching two classes at once. It’s a very stressful situation out there in our public schools.”
The substitute-teacher eligibility allowed in the bill will be a pilot program for the remainder of this school year and the next. The bill also will allow teachers whose certifications have lapsed to substitute for 180 days, up from a 90-day cut-off.
Kerry Mulvihill, a seventh grade science teacher in the Conestoga Valley School District in Lancaster County, has been an educator for more than two decades. She said the last two years have been the most difficult, and with teachers out more frequently, other staff members are expected to cover their class during prep periods, the only time during the day without students.
Mulvihill is thankful to the Legislature for passing the bill, but worries it’s not enough.
“So I’m kind of hopeful that we can get more retirees with the bill and more pre-service teachers,” Mulvihill remarked. “But I wish we could do more to really promote the importance of education to our community and the importance of supporting our substitutes as well as our in-house teachers.”
Mulvihill added she would also like to see an increased wage for teachers in Pennsylvania. The average starting salary for Pennsylvania educators during the 2019-2020 school year was $41,000 a year.
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