Schools mull teacher incentives

Associated Press

COLUMBIA, S.C.

The teacher shortage in poor, rural districts in South Carolina is so bad, the state is considering offering would-be instructors a way to graduate from college debt free.

The catch? They have to spend eight years in the state’s neediest districts, where turnover is the worst and the closest Wal-Mart can be up to 45 minutes away. There’s another, perhaps even bigger, hurdle with Gov. Nikki Haley’s proposal: The state doesn’t have enough teachers interested in its current $5 million loan-forgiveness program.

“We’re in deep trouble,” said Melanie Barton, director of South Carolina’s Education Oversight Committee. “We used to go to Ohio and Pennsylvania a lot to get teachers. Now those states don’t have surpluses.”

The teacher shortage is nationwide. In South Carolina, colleges are graduating about 2,000 fewer teachers than needed. Many college students don’t want to become teachers, and the ones that do typically don’t want to work in remote places. States are offering to wipe away college loans or increase salaries, but the incentives haven’t enticed enough teachers.

In Indiana, the Legislature recently passed the “Next Generation Hoosier Educators Scholarship,” rewarding students who commit to teaching five years in any public school with up to $30,000 off their college tuition. But the program is limited to 200 students yearly who graduate in the top 20 percent of their high school class.

California faces one of the nation’s most severe teacher shortages: Enrollment in college education programs has dropped more than 70 percent over the last decade, according to the Learning Policy Institute.

The Associated Press tried unsuccessfully to talk to teachers in the current loan forgiveness program. Messages left with multiple district officials were not returned.