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A few years ago I was sitting in a Georgia elementary school class reading to a rapt and engaged group of students when my school teacher sister stopped me. "Wait a minute, let me go next door and see what's happening," she said.
I remember the cacophony of noise coming from the classroom adjoining hers. Within minutes, my sister had restored order in her neighbor's class, showing her how to get back on track with her lessons and boosting her confidence that, with some help, she could do this.
I thought about that teacher when I spoke this week with Mary Lynne Calhoun, dean of the College of Education at UNC Charlotte. On Monday the League of Women Voters will join with UNCC, Queens University and Johnson C. Smith University to sponsor a public forum on how to keep "teachers teaching."
Calhoun and others will present information on the issue, including findings from teacher retention studies. Then the audience will break into discussion groups to develop strategies and actions.
I'll be out of town Monday and can't be there. But I hope some of you will. There are few more important issues for this community than attracting and keeping highly effective teachers in our public schools.
Research is unequivocal in the value to the success of students. Effective teachers are always listed among the top factors in student achievement.
But many good teachers aren't getting the help they need to stay in the profession. Calhoun said the problems are especially dire for young and new teachers. "Their cries for help are sometimes not heard," she said. Unlike the teacher my sister helped, many don't have someone they can talk to about what's going wrong for them.
North Carolina has conducted teacher working condition surveys since 2002, and they give good insight into the problems many teachers have - problems that drive many out of the profession. Among them: too little support from school leadership, particularly the principal; lack of support and engagement from parents and the community at large; inadequate facilities; insufficient pay and training; insufficient time to plan and collaborate; a work atmosphere where teachers feel no trust or respect.
Those problems have played a big role in North Carolina's teacher turnover the last few years. Last year, 12,595 of the 98,985 teachers left their jobs at the end of the 2008-09 school year. The tally was taken before school systems laid off teachers for budget reasons. The state teacher turnover average was 12.7 percent, including teachers who left their districts but stayed in North Carolina.
The cities and rural areas tend to have the highest turnover. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, the state's second largest system, had a turnover rate of 13.3 percent. (About 1,200 of 9,000 teachers left the system.) That's down from 14.6 percent in 2007-08. It was above 15 percent for the three years before that.
Those losses are felt not only in the classroom but in school systems' financial ledgers. As with any business, it costs to recruit, mentor and train new hires.
These factors all add to the importance of adequately and comprehensively tackling this problem. University of North Carolina system President Erskine Bowles recognized that several months ago and has made improving K-12 education the university system's top priority, by focusing on teacher preparation and partnerships. Calhoun says the education deans of UNC colleges meet regularly to discuss strategies for preparing more and better teachers, and providing support to keep teachers teaching.
None of us can afford to ignore or delay adequately addressing this problem. That's why Monday's forum is vital. We all lose when our schools don't have the teachers to give all students access to a quality education.
