SCSD responds to teacher shortage as some school districts struggle to fill vacancies

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — In a national teacher shortage, the Syracuse City School District has had to scramble to fill over 300 open teaching positions, far more than any other district in Onondaga County.

Most suburban districts have a handful of job postings available in the single or double digits. The North Syracuse Central School District, the second largest district in the county, is primarily looking for substitutes, suffering this past spring when full-time staff members were out sick with COVID-19.

North Syracuse has 23 job postings, and the Liverpool Central School District has 10 on the Online Application System for Educators (OLAS).

The Syracuse Teachers Association President Nicole Capsello told CNY Central the situation is far more dire in the city's schools, and she's not confident that they will be able to hire "qualified teachers" by the fall.

She expects the district to continue to have to use band-aid measures deployed in the spring, calling on administrators, part-time college students and retirees to staff classrooms.

Scott Persampieri, the school district’s director of recruitment, took questions on the issue Wednesday. He said it’s an unfair comparison to draw parallels between the urban SCSD and neighboring suburban schools, arguing that while they face more vacancies this year, it’s not “beyond the pale.”

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He said that the district typically has between 150 and 200 teacher hires each year, starting this summer with 300 vacancies. He said Wednesday that they now have 230.

“We’re going to need every last day of the summer to continue to make progress for sure,” Persampieri said.

Capsello attributes the higher rate of turnover to the pressures of COVID-19; Persampieri said it's possible, but otherwise said he couldn’t point to an exact reason as to why more teachers have resigned or retired from the district this year.

According to Persampieri, the newly negotiated teacher contract provides new hires who have a master’s degree with a $54,400 salary, and those with a bachelor’s degree $51,000.

“Pay is always going to be a factor right because people need to know that they're being fairly compensated, I think we are doing that here,” Persampieri said

While other districts are struggling to fully staff their classrooms, the Syracuse City School District appears to have the biggest mountain to climb with about one in six teaching positions left unfilled for the time being.

In an e-mail, OCMBOCES Superintendent Matthew Cook told CNY Central that in years gone by, districts were able to select from applications that outnumbered the positions they had available.

"Now, we are able to fill our positions for the most part but there aren't as many applicants and the hiring process takes longer because of that," said Cook.

Other districts are reporting similar issues.

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"We have experienced the challenges of staffing," Solvay Superintendent Jay Tinklepaugh told CNY Central in June, "The candidate pools are very small and or non-existent. Schools are competing from the same pools of candidates for the same positions."

The New York State Union of Teachers estimates that 180,000 teachers will need to be hired over the next decade to maintain current teacher-to-student ratios, needed from a dwindling hiring pool.

NYSUT data shows that from 2009 to 2017, the latest numbers available, enrollment in NYS teacher education programs has declined by 53%, expecting around 87,314 teachers to retire over the next five years.

"What I am finding that is different from the past is that if staff are eligible to retire, they are not sticking around," said Lyncourt Superintendent James Austin in June, "They are going the first year of eligibility where in the past they would have stayed in the profession longer."

STA President Nicole Capsello said that teachers have faced a higher degree of burnout through the pandemic, struggling to keep up with the high demands of remote and hybrid learning, with ever-changing health guidance.

"It made teaching very difficult and even more stressful than it already is, which drove people out of the profession completely," said Capsello.