Texas districts face acute shortage of secondary math and science teachers

A longtime shortage of math and science teachers in Texas is getting worse just as higher state graduation standards that require the completion of four years of math and four years of science are being phased in. That’s the key finding of a new study funded by Texas Instruments and the Texas Business and Education Coalition and conducted by Dr. Ed Fuller of the Department of Educational Administration at the University of Texas at Austin.
 
The gap between the number of new math and science teachers that districts need and the number coming into our schools has widened dramatically since 2004. The state is currently able to recruit only half as many math teachers as it needs. Things are even worse for districts in need of science teachers, especially high school science, where districts are only able to fill 20 percent of their teaching vacancies with fully qualified teachers. Thirty to 35 percent of teachers assigned to math and science classes are already teaching outside their field, and Fuller’s supply and demand projections suggest that the shortage will continue to increase for the next five years.

Low-income schools hit hardest

The report also found that the shortage has increasingly meant that less-qualified teachers are assigned to teach secondary math and science at schools with lower income students. Fuller’s research confirms that campuses with the biggest percentages of low-income students are likely to have the fewest properly qualified math and science teachers. “The students most in need of the most well-qualified teachers were found to be the least likely to have access to such teachers,” says the study. In low-performing high schools, the percentage of out-of-field science teachers is 41 percent, and the percentage who failed their science certification exam on the first try is 40 percent.

Fuller said incentives to put more qualified teachers into hard-to-staff schools are not a real solution, because there simply are not enough fully qualified math and science teachers to go around. Fuller contends that the state needs a plan to produce more and that means addressing both teacher induction and retention.

Fixing the problem

One of Fuller’s prescriptions for recruiting and keeping good new teachers is a state investment in mentoring for every beginning math and science teacher. Fuller noted that the current cost of teacher turnover for school districts equals what it would cost to mentor all new teachers. However, he estimates that it would take 15 years to eliminate the shortage of math and science teachers if the state focuses exclusively on helping new teachers.

While mentoring will help, it’s only one part of the answer. Fuller’s research shows that secondary math and science teachers continue to earn substantially less than their peers in the private sector, even after adjusting for summer months. Teachers made, on average, between $23,000 and $40,000 less than individuals in nonteaching careers in math and science.

Getting a grip on Texas’ teacher pipeline

In looking at the numbers of newly certified math and science teachers, the State Board for Educator Certification (SBEC)  reports the number of initial educator certificates issued between Sept. 1, 2007, and Aug. 31, 2008, in math was 1,706, while 1,657 were issued in science. In the same one-year period, SBEC granted 1,092 probationary certificates in math and 1,256 in science.

Listed below are the 10 educator preparation programs that produced the most math teachers (initial certificates) from September 2007 through August 2008. Four of the ten are alternative certification programs. These 10 programs combined produced 38 percent of the initially certified math teachers from 123 educator preparation programs in Texas in the reporting period.

*Alternative Certification Program

Listed among the top 10 producers of science teachers (initial certificates) from September 2007 through August 2008 were eight alternative certification programs and two universities. Forty-one percent of all initial certificates in science issued during this period can be attributed to these 10 educator preparation programs.

*Alternative Certification Program

At least one definitive conclusion can be drawn from this data: Improving student learning in math and science will be a steep hill to climb until we improve our supply of qualified teachers.

—Secondary Mathematics and Science Teachers in Texas: Supply, Demand, and Quality, by Dr. Ed Fuller, Department of Educational Administration, University of Texas at Austin, October 2008.
— “Texas teacher shortage in math, science worsens,” by Terrence Stutz, The Dallas Morning News, Feb. 10, 2009.