Teacher Shortage in KS

I read in the paper the other day that 13,000 Kansas teachers will be eligible to retire within the next 5 years. Curiosity impels me to ask, do you know any education majors or high school kids going into education? Can we get that many teachers graduated and teaching that soon?

so does that mean the ones that are still working will be paid more money to get them to hang around?

http://www.aft.org/presscenter/releases/2007/statereleases/SalarySurvey-KS.pdf

"The average teacher salary in Kansas for the 2004-05 school year was $39,351, up 1.9 percent from the previous year. Kansas was ranked 40th in the nation for beginning teacher salary, at $27,840, an increase of 2.2 percent from 2004.
The average teacher salary nationally in 2004-05 was $47,602, a 2.2 percent increase from the previous year. This falls short of the rate of inflation for that year, which was 3.4 percent. Between 2003 and 2005, the buying power of the average teacher salary decreased by almost $800."

I know a guy who quit teaching at Garden City and now works for about half the pay. He says he got tired of being the only one in the classroom who spoke english.

Eligible to retire and going to retire are two different things. I'm sure many of them will keep teaching, while others will retire and go to another district to "double dip".

dz724 wrote:

Eligible to retire and going to retire are two different things. I'm sure many of them will keep teaching, while others will retire and go to another district to "double dip".

I thought the state had made double dipping illegal now? Anyway, with 13,000 eligible to retire, don't you think if even half of them do so, it will be really hard to fill all those spots?

It's legal for teachers to "retire" from one district, then teach in another... so says my husband (works for aft).

I know a guy who had his teaching certificate and taught in Garden City for a couple of years who now works in the oil patch..it sucked that bad

It definitely pays to be bilingual in Garden City. We know a student teacher there who isn't. It's not easy for her. If you were fluent in Spanish, I imagine it would be an okay place to be.