District faces teacher shortage

MAT-SU -- With the first day of school less than two weeks away, the Mat-Su Borough School District is scrambling to fill 49 vacancies before thousands of students walk though the front doors of Valley schools for the start of classes.

Paula Harrison, director of human resources for the school district, said she is concerned that some classes may not have qualified teachers for the start of school.

"At this late date, most of the good applicants have already signed with other districts," Harrison said. "We may end up starting off with substitutes in some of the classrooms."

Kim Floyd, public information specialist for the school district, said the district is late hiring teachers because the state Legislature did not approve final funding for education until May, two months later than usual.

"Because of other fiscal issues the Legislature was dealing with, they didn't act on education 'til near the close of the legislative session," Floyd said.

Without pre-approved money, the district could not risk signing teachers to contracts, despite the fact that the state Legislature had agreed to increase school funding, Floyd said.

"We had to wait," Floyd said, "because neither the borough nor the school district wanted to get caught between a rock and a hard place."

Harrison said the need for high school math teachers is especially urgent but there are also additional openings in science, language arts, special education, Spanish, the extended learning program and for a school nurse and elementary classroom teachers.

"I'm usually down to a maximum of eight or nine vacancies by August 23rd," Harrison said. "We're getting a late start."

Interviews are currently under way. New teacher graduates and qualified teachers may call the school district's human resource department at 746-9252 to inquire about openings.

Contact Joel Davidson at joel.davidson@frontiersman.com.