Department of Education Provides New Raise the Bar Brief and Map Data
The U.S. Department of Education has published a new Raise the Bar Policy Brief, Eliminating Educator Shortages through Increasing Educator Diversity and Addressing High-need Shortage Areas. The brief highlights key Department efforts to support and advance educator diversity and address high-need shortage areas, as well as national and state data on teacher diversity and areas in which states have particular shortages. It includes visualizations spotlighting state and national data on educator diversity, including in a range of roles and the diversity of students enrolled in educator preparation programs, as well as data on states’ projected shortage areas for 2023-24.
The Department is committed to a comprehensive policy agenda to recruit, prepare, and retain a racially, culturally, and linguistically diverse and well-prepared educator workforce. This includes promoting educator diversity while recruiting, preparing, retaining, and supporting teachers, administrators, and other educators and ensuring that education is a profession that people from all backgrounds can pursue. Developing and supporting a diverse educator workforce is critical to strengthening student success. Additionally, addressing high-need shortage areas ensures all students have access to a high-quality, well-rounded education. Through Raise the Bar: Lead the World, the Department is working in partnership with states, tribes, local educational agencies (LEAs), and educator preparation programs (EPPs), including Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), and other Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), to eliminate educator shortages in our nation’s schools and to strengthen and diversify the education profession.
The Department has also updated the map on the Raise the Bar: Eliminate the Educator Shortage webpage highlighting progress in local public education job recovery by state. The map reflects the progress of states in returning to pre-pandemic staffing levels in local public education employment.
This updated map compares average employment in October 2022 thru September 2023 relative to October 2018 thru September 2019. It includes an adjustment based on the change between 2019 and 2021 of people aged 5 to 17. A positive number on the map indicates that local education employment exceeds its pre-pandemic level in that state, while a negative number reflects how depleted local education employment is relative to the pre-pandemic period.
As a 12-month moving average is used for state data, these estimates lag national employment estimates. This data reflects all local public education positions filled, including teachers, school leaders, and other school and district-level staff. The data does not indicate whether teaching positions are filled with educators with emergency, provisional, or full certification for the area they are assigned to teach.
Tags: data, diversity, federal issues, shortage, workforce development
