CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – The national teacher shortage took its toll on local schools, and Clarksville-Montgomery County School System has had to respond in a big way.
The district has over 5,200 employees. “This year we have hired over 500 new teachers as of this week, and we still have 50 positions open,” said CMCSS Chief Human Resources Officer Jeanine Johnson, speaking during a presentation by school administrators on Thursday for the Clarksville Area Chamber of Commerce.
She said the district started to feel the impact of shortages two years ago, realizing, for example, they didn’t have an extra 50 elementary teachers in their applicant pool.
“Unfortunately, not as many people are going into education, choosing that as a career. That number is going down,” she said, noting there are many things the district is doing to address the issue.
“We had a special event for community members that had a bachelor’s degree and were thinking about being a teacher but had never gone to school to become a teacher,” Johnson said. “We had 114 people show up for that event,” she said. The state allows those applicants to be issued teaching permits while they take the necessary classes to get their teaching license.
Johnson said the school district has also had 28 job fairs to recruit teachers.
Sean Impeartrice, director of middle schools, said the district and Austin Peay State University worked closely to develop the “Grow Your Own” teacher apprenticeship program.
As the program grew, the state eventually asked to take over the program and roll it out statewide, Impeartrice said.
Currently, 160 local residents are training to become certified teachers, he said.
Finding bus drivers
Finding enough bus drivers has been difficult as well.
“We have 237 drivers, and we are covering over 300 routes,” Chief Operations Officer Norm Brumblay said, adding they are at about 65% driver staffing.
The district’s controversial decision to change the parent responsibility zone, reducing the number of students picked up by buses, allowed CMCSS to eliminate about 28 routes, he said.
“We have 20 candidates in training today. … We have 58 new applications processing, pending background checks,” he said, adding there were four candidates pending interviews and seven new drivers this week.
Brumblay said when bus drivers are absent, it takes several drivers to make up for that one absence.
To address absenteeism, several incentives were created for attendance, performance and for drivers taking additional routes.