Wake County still needs hundreds of teachers, bus drivers and other school workers
The Wake County school system still needs to hire 343 more teachers and hundreds of other school support staff a month into the school year.
Wake County school administrators presented a staffing update on Tuesday showing that the district now has 891 openings for teachers, instructional assistants, bus drivers and cafeteria workers.
Wake has launched a marketing campaign to try to fill the openings, which are having an impact on the education being provided to students.
“We’re doing everything we can to not only fill the vacancies but plan for the second semester,” AJ Muttillo, assistant superintendent for human resources, told the school board.
Wake’s hiring update comes as schools across the nation face continuing staffing shortages that are forcing the remaining workers to do more to fill the gap.
Back in August, a survey by the N.C. School Superintendents’ Association showed a 27% increase in reported vacancies compared to the same time period last year. Altogether, the state’s superintendents estimated their school districts had 11,297 vacant positions.
Wake had 958 vacancies reported in August.
‘Crisis that we’re in’
School board member Monika Johnson-Hostler said two of her high schools are down 10 teachers, affecting the availability of honors and Advanced Placement courses.. Johnson-Hostler said parents and teachers are worried about the affect the shortage is having on students.
“All the parents understand the crisis that we’re in,” Johnson-Hostler said. “No one is saying they expect us to pull off a miracle. But they do want their children to have access to the same coursework that the rest of our district appears to be having.”
Superintendent Cathy Moore said the problem is that the hiring pool is slim right now.
“We’re likely to see vacancies last for a longer period of time prior to being filled,” Moore said.
Vacancy rates
The vacancy rates in Wake vary across departments.
▪ Wake has 267 bus driver vacancies for a 30.27% vacancy rate. It’s both higher than in August and 13.23 percentage points higher than a year ago.
The driver vacancy rate is so high now that Wake is running 52 fewer school bus routes than compared to last school year. This has led to longer rides on more crowded buses for students.
“The shortage of bus drivers is really crumbling the system that we’ve had in place in Wake County for years and years and years to make our schools healthy and to keep our empty seats full,” said board member Roxie Cash.
▪ Wake has 103 school-based child nutrition services openings for a vacancy rate of 13.05%.
▪ Wake has 178 instructional assistant openings for a vacancy rate of 6.3%. The vacancy rate is much higher at 8.61% for special-education instructional assistants.
Wake has significantly fewer vacancies for instructional assistants and cafeteria workers than a year ago. Muttillo credited the improvement to pay raises that have raised the minimum salary to $16 an hour.
▪ Wake’s 343 teacher openings represent an overall 2.91% vacancy rate — an improvement from the 3.38% rate in August. The vacancy rate is much higher for special-education teachers at 5.48%.
The current teacher vacancy rate is 0.62 percentage points higher than last September when Wake had 69 fewer openings.
To help keep vacancies down, Wake has hired 1,067 new teachers since July 1 and rehired 982 other teachers.
Marketing and recruitment
Wake has tried to fill the positions with advertising on social media and sponsored job postings on recruitment sites. The district also has advertised on radio and television for bus drivers.
Wake has a virtual teacher fair scheduled for Nov. 22. It’s also looking to hire teachers at fall college and university recruitment fairs and offering early contracts to people who are doing student-teaching in Wake.
Wake is also contacting recent retirees about returning to the district.
Muttillo said they’ve tried to streamline the hiring process for applicants.
This story was originally published September 20, 2022 at 3:21 PM.
