The Assembly will consider a bill Tuesday to expand the substitute teaching pool and help schools facing staff and substitute shortages around the state.
Last week, the bill unanimously passed the Assembly Committee on Education, with both Democrats and Republicans voting in support.
“This is one of these bills where I think we might find some common ground on both sides of the aisle, as this is something in need,” bill author Rep. Jeremy Thiesfeldt, R-Fond du Lac, told his colleagues during the public hearing last week. “We have had schools all across the state, public, private, doesn’t matter, are struggling to find substitute teachers.”
AB 975 would allow students enrolled in teacher education programs who are at least 21 years old, juniors and have at least 15 hours of classroom observation to earn a substitute teaching license. A proposed amendment would lower the age requirement to 20.
“The biggest thing is just to expand the pool of people available,” Thiesfeldt said. “These are students who chose teaching because this is something they’re excited about doing.”
Schools have faced growing staffing challenges during the pandemic. In the Madison Metropolitan School District, for example, the substitute teacher pool has shrunk to 391 from more than 900 just a few years ago.
Fill rates for staff absences in MMSD the week of Jan. 24 were around 60% — but only because the district deployed 40 or more central office staffers to fill some unfilled positions, according to a human resources update provided to School Board members on Jan. 27.
Wisconsin Association of School Boards government relations director Dan Rossmiller spoke in support of the bill last week.
“This bill would give school districts, school boards an option that they don’t currently have,” Rossmiller said. “We’ve got to find people to cover the classrooms one way or another.”
The state Department of Public Instruction and School Administrators’ Alliance are among other groups that have registered in support.
Not everyone is in favor, however. The state’s largest teachers union, the Wisconsin Education Association Council, registered against the bill. Madison Teachers Inc. president Michael Jones wrote in an email to the Cap Times last week that legislators’ efforts would be better focused on increasing funding to schools and listening to those already in the profession.
“If the state legislature was serious about increasing the number of available substitute staff in public schools, they would properly fund all schools in the first place so salaried and substitute teachers wouldn’t leave the profession for more lucrative jobs,” Jones wrote. “They would also make attempts to assure educator voice and autonomy instead of passing unfunded mandates and spiteful legislation, using our children, our families, and our educators as pawns in their cynical political games to gain favor with wealthy donors and talking heads.”
University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Education Dean Diana Hess said she isn’t necessarily against the bill, but doesn’t expect UW students to see much of a change, as they already taking part in “very demanding programs.”
“There’s no time for people to take a day off of school to go substitute teach,” Hess said. “When people are student teaching or doing practicum in the schools, that is a role where they are there as a learner.”
Ted Neitzke, the CEO of CESA 6 — a cooperative educational service agency that provides training and facilitates communication among school districts in northeast Wisconsin — suggested the change to legislators and told the committee last week that superintendents in his area were enthusiastic about the idea.
“This is something that could immediately impact, if passed this session yet, the quality of education kids are getting,” Neitzke said.
He added that student teachers could help when college classes are stopped for winter break in early January or toward the end of the year, as colleges let out in May while K-12 schools go into June. It could help existing staff, too, as they would regain their planning periods and other time they have lost to filling in for colleagues.
“We need greater advocates for our existing staff,” he said. “This is also a retention strategy.”
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