The average salary for a teacher in the North Lawrence Community School Corporation is approximately $52,000. (Lauren Tucker)
Rural areas across the state are being hit especially hard by the lack of teachers entering the profession. But the Monroe County Community School Corp. isn’t struggling as much.
There are over 2,700 vacant educator positions – ranging from school leadership to student support and operations – in Indiana; 1,419 of those are teaching-specific roles. Nationally, in 2023, there were more than 55,000 open K-12 teaching positions.
Low pay and teacher burnout have contributed to the struggle to recruit and retain teachers.
“It's a really stressful job; we're getting teachers to do more with less time,” said Alexander Cuenca, associate dean of accreditation and associate professor in the Indiana University School of Education. “We’ve added over the last 20 years lots of things to teachers’ plates. We've added mental health crises to their plates. We've added gun violence to their plates.”
Lacy Hawkins, a social studies teacher at Bedford North Lawrence High School and president of the North Lawrence Education Association, said the corporation had a hard time finding a Spanish teacher; finding math and science teachers is also a challenge. There are often only one or two applicants, she said. When Hawkins started teaching 15 years ago, the field was much more competitive.
“I went through two rounds interviews to get my job. And now it's like, someone applied, right?” Hawkins said.
To account for open teacher positions, Hawkins said the corporation combines classes or outsources to an online teacher, often from Vincennes University or Indiana State University.
“That's frustrating for those kids,” she said, “because they like the human interaction and the ability for a teacher to be in the room doing things, manipulating things and setting up simulations and things like that.”
Sharon Baker, director of human resources for Perry Township Schools, said in the last few years, their schools have gone into a new school year and not had every teacher position filled. But they have a contract with Kelly Education to help them fill those 10-12 positions temporarily. Often, those people do not have an education degree.
“Sometimes you can have a retired teacher who's taught forever, and then other times you can have individuals [who] ideally have a love of learning and love of kids,” Baker said. “They get some training through Kelly, and then the office staff and principal, assistant principal, work with them in the school, and they usually partner up with a teacher in the school.”
Baker said Perry Township used to have around 50 student teachers per semester in its classrooms. The number is half that now.
“There are not enough teachers going into the field,” she said.
To combat this, Jescee Spencer, HR coordinator, said Perry Township offers early commitment bonuses, holds career fairs and hires classroom interns.
“That keeps them committed and keeps them in our district, so that they don't go look somewhere else,” Spencer said.
But Jeffry Henderson, assistant superintendent of human resources and operations for MCCSC, said the corporation hasn’t struggled much with a shortage of teachers. However, according to the Indiana Educator Job Board, as of Feb. 6, there were eight full-time positions open within MCCSC.
“I wouldn't describe our situation as having a shortage,” Henderson said. “I would describe our situation as having a smaller candidate pool than 10 or 15 years ago.”
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MCCSC offers various benefits, professional development opportunities and instructional coaches to help support and retain teachers. Many students from IU’s School of Education also go on to teach in MCCSC schools. But turnover for young teachers is relatively high.
“Those individuals, after two or three years, sometimes will make the decision to relocate,” Henderson said. “They'll move back closer to home. They'll move to a location where a significant other has a job.”
Across the state, for the 2023-24 school year, the Indiana Education Employment Relations Board reported that the average teacher salary was $60,557.
Salaries within the corporation are more competitive than in rural areas, Henderson said. For the 2023-24 school year, MCCSC’s starting salary for a teacher with a Bachelor of Science was $52,150 and $55,275 for a Master of Science. Each of those salaries has increased just over $5,000 for the 2024-25 school year.
Hawkins said the average salary for teachers in the North Lawrence Community School Corporation is approximately $52,000.
Various education bills are being proposed this legislative session to raise the minimum salary. But Jenny Noble-Kuchera, Monroe County Education Association president, said she is worried about losing collective bargaining rights, which allow her and MCCSC administrators to negotiate teacher pay.
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“When that happens, I unfortunately foresee a huge exodus of certified teachers [going] to other states where those measures are still in place,” she said.
And fewer students are going to college. A recent Gallup survey shows more people are distrustful of higher education. That’s another factor making the search for qualified teachers harder.
“It's like this pendulum right where it was, like, we were telling everybody go to college, and now we're saying, like, nobody needs to go to college,” she said. “That's going to result in fewer teachers, but it also results in a mindset, and I see this in my students. This isn't important. Education is not important. I don't need this. I just need a job, and I hate that for them.”
Cuenca said teacher shortages are especially acute in math, science and special education. Over the last 10 to 20 years, Cuenca has seen fewer students have pursuing an education degree at IU.
Fewer students could mean less funding and resources, Cuenca said. There is also the potential for some programs to shut down completely. One option legislators can take is making the process of becoming a teacher easier and lowering the qualifications.
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“The more difficulty you have to recruit teachers into a traditional undergrad program, the more the legislature might have to engage to make the qualifications to be a teacher, to lower those so that they can have teachers in the classroom,” he said. “And that has all kinds of different effects for the quality of teaching, the quality student preparation, how well students are prepared in science, and then when they go into college, how well are they doing in those classes.”
To try to attract more students to the profession, the School of Education offers an accelerated master’s program that allows students to complete both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in five years. They can finish their bachelor’s degree in a specific content area, such as history or math, and also become certified as a teacher through earning their master’s. Regardless, Cuenca said it’s still hard to recruit teachers when the pay is so low and school curriculums are becoming politicized with anti-diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
“I think we think that the profession of teaching is really easy when it's really not,” he said. “All of us have had a teacher. All of us know what the teaching profession is. We have spent time with teachers more than any other profession, and so we believe that anyone can do it.”
By committing herself fully to teaching and providing her students with a positive experience, Hawkins hopes she can help her students see the value in education.
“Sometimes they say, ‘I like this, like I would like to do this,’ like they want to give to the next generation,” Hawkins said. “So, I mean, it's small, but I think that's for me, the best I can see is, like, all I can do is just give 100 percent, give my best to these kids and hope that they take that and make a bigger impact on the world.”
