THOUSANDS OF VACANCIES
More than 3,500 teaching positions open in Florida, but some report rates are lower than last year
The school year is already a few weeks old, and school districts in Florida still have 3,500 jobs to fill. But they’re happy about it.
Broward County has 145 openings, fewer than the160 needed a year ago. Palm Beach County still needs 133 instructors, compared with 156 at this time last year and 250 the previous year. In Miami-Dade, recruiters are still searching for more than 200 new instructors.
In Palm Beach County, where there are about 13,000 teachers, the vacancy rate was about 2% last year and is now1%, “lower than anything I can remember,” said Tim Kubrick, the school district’s
teacher recruitment manager. Most empty spots are in elementary schools, but the district also needs special-education and language arts teachers, aswell as 14 guidance counselors, he said.
One of the reasons for lower vacancies: Salary supplements, approved by taxpayers in each county, attracted lots of new applicants. Declining enrollments also have lessened the need for as many new teachers as previous years.
It’s up to a school’s principal to decide how to cover a classroom that lacks a teacher, Kubrick said. Options include long-term substitutes and school staff hired to do other assignments, such as academic coaches and teachers who assist stu
dents with disabilities, temporarily helping out until a new teacher is hired.
Teachers who are just out of college earn the same first-year base salaries whether they choose Palm Beach, Broward or Miami-Dade: $41,000, although most are eligible for bonuses and supplements.
In Miami-Dade, a new tax approved by voters adds $5,125 to new-teacher salaries for the next four years, said Tony White, United Teachers of Dade vice president.
All of the 20,000 teachers inthe school district get a raise from the new tax, ranging from 12.5% to 27.75%, White said. This supplement helped keep many teachers in the profession and lessen the number of new teachers needed this year. It also attracted some who had been teaching at charter schools, White said.
Broward added 425 new hires this year to its teaching staff of about 15,000, said Anna Fusco, Broward Teachers-Union president.
“We retained more this year so we didn’t have to hire as many,” Fusco said. “We used to hire 1,200 in a year.”
Broward’s enrollment has been declining, thus the need for fewer teachers.
Onthe first day of school last year, Broward had 271,244 students; this year, the count was 268,688. Palm Beach County’s enrollment is trending flat. Although figures for this year have not been released, the district had 194,499 students last year, about the same as the previous year.
Geometry teacher Vera Obaido is among Palm Beach County’s new recruits. She worked as a teacher in Volusia County and arrived at Atlantic High School in Delray Beach lastweek for her 21st year in the classroom.
Obaido moved with her husband to Boca Raton after he got a job teaching at a private school. As she was deciding where she should work, she said the clincher was a voter-approved referendum last year in Palm Beach County that gave teachers with 20 years’ experience an extra $10,000 a year. The package was designed as a way to attract and keep experienced teachers.
“I chose Palm Beach County because of the supplements,” she said. She earned $51,000 in Volusia but will earn $66,000 at Atlantic.
Obaido said her extensive experience teaching in Florida schools helped her transition to her new job. But she likes the many supports for new teachers that her principal, Tara Dellegrottihas implemented at Atlantic, including monthly new-teacher meetings, a mentor assigned to each new hire and monthly meetings where veterans share what hasworked for them in the classroom.
Dellegrotti- Ocampo said she hired six teachers this year and has no vacancies.