Educators, lawmakers meet to discuss teacher shortage crisis

TULSA, Okla. (KTUL) -- Why are there so many emergency certified teachers?

That’s the question lawmakers and educators in the state are trying to address.

Several university representatives met at the University of Tulsa to brainstorm ways to fix the crisis.

All packed into one room, lawmakers and educators looked for ways to make education a priority in Oklahoma.

“It is a crisis,” Representative John Waldron said.

In just two months, Oklahoma hired 1,600 emergency certified teachers.

“Just ten years ago I think we would do 32 in a year,” Waldron said. “So, the number of certified emergency teachers has exploded.”

Waldron and educators want to know why and how to fix it.

“I think we should do student loan forgiveness, paid internships for teachers coming out of education schools who don’t have to get a second job waiting tables while they are learning how to teach in the classroom,” he said.

Doctor Robin Fuxa with Oklahoma State University says the pay raise last year for teachers helped.

“We certified about 240 last year,” Fuxa said.

But she says only about 70 percent of teaching students who graduated from OSU, stayed in Oklahoma.

She wants to see the state put more money into its teaching schools.

“We need to truly invest in the teacher pipeline in our university programs to make sure we have teachers ready from day one,” she said.

Fuxa says it will take educators and none educators to move this program, and give Oklahoma and its children a fighting chance.

Those educators and lawmakers will meet again next month and then decide on what incentives they’d like to introduce during next year’s legislature.

Scholarships, loan forgiveness, and free certified teacher exams are all contenders.