SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - A Utah school district is looking out of state to fill hundreds of teaching positions as schools across the state struggle with teacher recruitment and retention.
Steve Dimond, human resources director for Canyons School District, has been attending job fairs across the country in search of candidates to fill 200 teaching jobs within the district, The Deseret News reported (https://bit.ly/2o0HFmC).
More than a third of the district’s new hires came from out of state last year.
Dimond attributed the teacher shortage to fewer Utah college students graduating with teaching degrees.
“We’re not anywhere even close to being able to produce the number of teachers that we need within our local universities,” Dimond said. “There’s not enough kids going into education. So we’ve got to go outside to places where they are still producing more teachers than what they have jobs.”
Canyons School District is one of many districts across the state having difficulty keeping its teachers.
More than half of public school teachers who started teaching in 2008 left the profession by 2015, according to a recent report from the University of Utah.
Dimond said the district is hoping to encourage teachers who may be considering retirement to continue working in the classroom.
“We’d love them to stay,” he said. “They’re great teachers who have great skill. We always hope we can keep them a little longer.”
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Information from: Deseret News, https://www.deseretnews.com
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