Teacher shortage stokes covid threat for W.Pa. schools fighting to stay in the classroom

More than 5,000 schools across the country, including in Pittsburgh, spent last week teaching children remotely or delaying their return to the classroom as covid infections continued to skyrocket with the spread of the highly contagious omicron variant.

While the vast majority of districts in Southwestern Pennsylvania and elsewhere have been spared so far, a number of local school leaders told the Tribune-Review they are prepared to move fast and know their days could be numbered — particularly if teachers become sickened or have to quarantine.

As much of a factor as covid plays in such a potential decision, the critically low supply of substitute teachers is an equal one.

“My biggest concern will be the availability of staff,” said Eric Curry, superintendent of Derry Area schools. “If we see large numbers of staff out, it will be very difficult to have the schools open. Substitutes are few and far between.”

None of his district’s 136 teachers are now out as part of a quarantine, Curry said. But to have even 10% of teachers out would require 13 substitutes, he noted.

“Most days, even at a much lower absentee rate, we have difficulty filling vacant teachers with substitutes,” he said.

Highlands School District last week had 25 confirmed covid cases, up from three the week of Dec. 20, said Superintendent Monique Mawhinney. Still, the district remains committed to continuing in-person classes.

But, like other district leaders around the region, Mawhinney said a potential increase of covid cases among staff is a significant concern.

“It is impossible to get substitutes across all school districts,” she said.

Greensburg Salem had to shut its middle school for two weeks in November after a covid outbreak.

“We have been preparing for the possibility of remote learning all year,” Superintendent Ken Bissell said.

Along with covid, his district also faces a critical shortage of substitutes — not only for its 225 teachers but also administrative assistants, cafeteria workers, custodians, bus drivers and other staff.

“Finding substitutes in these areas is becoming more and more difficult,” Bissell said. “The drop in the overall labor pool associated with schools and education adds to stresses created by covid cases, quarantines and isolations.”

Teacher shortage

Pennsylvania colleges and universities that train teachers have seen a nosedive in enrollment over the past decade, with only a third of the number of potential teachers enrolled in such programs today as there were in 2011, the Tribune-Review recently reported.

In the 2010-11 academic year, Pennsylvania granted 21,045 new education certifications — basically a state license that says a graduate is qualified to teach, according to the state Department of Education. By the 2019-20 academic year, that figure had dropped to just below 7,000.

And that drop wasn’t fueled by the pandemic. In the three years before covid arrived, Pennsylvania granted an average of 7,350 education certifications per year, records show.

Members of the Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators see the impact of this growing shortage on a daily basis, executive director Mark DiRocco told the Tribune-Review last month.

“It is not looming. It is here in spades,” DiRocco said. “Education is in more of a crisis than most people realize.”

Pennsylvania’s 500 school districts educate 1.7 million students with more than 120,000 teachers, according to the Pennsylvania School Boards Association. Nationwide, there are nearly 50 million public school students with around 3.5 million teachers to educate them, by last count of the U.S. Department of Education.

But there were 575,000 fewer local and state education employees in the U.S. in October than in February 2020, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That included a net loss of 65,000 public education workers between September 2021 and October.

The shortage of teachers extends to substitutes — and that is contributing to the threat of school closures across Pennsylvania and a shift to remote learning during the spread of the omicron variant, said Chris Lilienthal, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania State Education Association teachers union.

“We are starting to see some schools have to shift temporarily to remote instruction,” he said. “Too many school staffers have to quarantine. It isn’t widespread, but it definitely is a concern.”

Unlike last school year, closures in 2021-22 have been more temporary, Lilienthal said.

“The goal is to keep that time period as short as possible while making sure we’re being as safe as possible for students and staff,” he said. “Our members definitely want to be in the classroom with their students. They know that’s the best environment for the majority of students.”

Pennsylvania Act 91, recently passed with bipartisan support, is designed to help districts cope with substitute shortages. It allows them to use education majors who have completed their college training but not yet received their diploma or completed a required exam to fill in as day-to-day or long-term temporary substitutes.

The law also increases the length of time an educator with an inactive certification can return to the classroom as a substitute — from 90 days per school year to up to 180 days.

“It’s intended to make sure the pool of substitutes that is available is being deployed in a way that’s the most effective,” Lilienthal said.

Around the country

For the first week of January, 5,225 public schools across the U.S. — out of roughly 130,000 — moved away from in-person classes because of pandemic-related issues, according to Burbio.com, a data service that has tracked such closures since 2020. Some moved to remote learning, while others delayed their return from the holidays.

Last week’s numbers peaked on Wednesday and Thursday — with nearly 3,700 schools impacted each day.

That included Chicago, Cleveland and Bay Area schools in Northern California but also places like Danbury, Conn., Montgomery County, Md., and Poughkeepsie, N.J.

Pittsburgh Public Schools introduced rolling closures last week because of staffing shortages, opting for remote learning for one or more days initially at 17 schools — a figure that grew to about 30 as the week wore on. All are supposed to reopen Monday, according to the district.

“As students try their best to recoup a year of unfinished learning, we are committed to keeping schools open to provide high-quality in-person learning,” interim Superintendent Wayne Walters said in a statement. “Our rolling closure approach allows us to engage in a day-by-day review of staffing with our school leaders to ensure we are only closing schools for staffing shortages as necessary.”

Woodland Hills School District in Pittsburgh’s eastern suburbs announced it will move to virtual learning for the rest of January.

“The number of documented cases in Allegheny County is approaching 5,000 per day,” the district’s Covid Response Unit posted in a notice. “The omicron variant of covid-19 is highly transmissible, and we’re seeing rates of transmission amongst our scholars, faculty and staff that are concerning.”

Lessons learned

A number of local superintendents around the region said they are prepared for the switch to remove learning if it’s required.

All said they have the necessary computers and WiFi technology to go remote and learned valuable lessons over the past two-plus school years to do so.

“Our teachers have done a great job adapting to our platform and having materials ready to go in the event of a sudden shutdown,” said New Kensington-Arnold Superintendent Chris Sefcheck, who noted the district had three or four employees out last week with covid. “The last two years have taught all of us ways to reach students when face-to-face is not an option, and just knowing it could happen again, that experience is fresh in our minds.”

But all districts would like to continue offering in-person classes for the rest of the year, if possible.

Kiski Area School District this week warned families that a shortage of bus drivers, which is described as “extreme,” is threatening to force a move to remote learning — something administrators say they are working hard to avoid.

“We are very aware that parents work and calling an emergency instructional day creates difficulties for our families,” said Kiski Area Superintendent Misty Slavic. “Also, remote learning is not the ideal learning environment for our students.”

Likewise, other district officials around Westmoreland County say they are hoping for the best while remaining prepared for whatever might come.

“We have no plans to go remote for the entire district, unless we don’t have the staff to transport and safely run in-person classes,” said Ligonier Valley Superintendent Tim Kantor. “We are good right now with teachers and bus drivers, but that could change at any time.”

He noted Ligonier Valley has 115 teachers and 12 substitutes, with four of those substitutes assigned daily to schools. The others are shared with Derry Area and Greater Latrobe school districts.

Derry Area “has been fortunate thus far this school year,” said Curry.

“I hope we can continue to keep kids in school the remainder of the year,” he said. “We are not currently nearing a closure, and hopefully we do not have a significant increase in community spread.”

Joyce Hanz, Tawnya Panizzi, Brian C. Rittmeyer and Tanisha Thomas contributed to this report.