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Pennsylvania teachers heading out of state to find jobs

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Teacher shortages in the South are attracting job-seekers.

Hunting for a position as a first-grade teacher in Pennsylvania became a full-time job for Williams Township native Sarah Widmer.

After Widmer graduated from Shippensburg University in 2012, she immediately began her job hunt, applying to every school district in Pennsylvania; all 500 of them. Some multiple times. She estimates she submitted resumes for 40 jobs in the Quakertown Community School District alone.

No one ever called her for an interview.

Sarah WidmerSarah Widmer
She accepted a teaching assistant position with the Allentown School District in hopes of getting her foot in the door. Then Allentown announced it was laying off teachers, not hiring.

"I was just getting more frustrated throughout the year. Nobody was hiring," the Wilson Area High School graduate said. "I felt like I was getting nowhere."

Widmer decided to take her search beyond the Keystone State. She got certified in New Jersey and Virginia, a process that involved considerable cost and lots of tests.

The New Jersey applications weren't fruitful. When she applied to school systems in 40 different Virginia counties, her phone finally began to ring with about 20 interview offers.

"It was insane. It was such a difference than Pennsylvania," Widmer said.

Widmer accepted a job in the Culpeper County Public Schools system, where about 40 of roughly 75 new hires all hail from Pennsylvania, she said.

"(As) soon as people see you are from Pennsylvania, they say, 'You must be a teacher,'" Widmer said of encountering locals.

Growing trend

The exodus of teachers from Pennsylvania is not a new trend, but it is becoming increasingly hard for graduates of Pennsylvania teaching programs to find K-12 teaching jobs in Pennsylvania public schools, said Wythe Keever, spokesman for the Pennsylvania State Education Association.

Even in the 1990s, the state's degree-granting colleges of education were graduating more new teachers than there were available jobs in a given year, Keever said. Pair that with the funding cuts school districts have faced in recent years, and more Pennsylvania districts are firing than hiring.

In Pennsylvania, there is still demand for math, science and special education teachers. But a first-year, first-grade teacher like Widmer faces tough competition from qualified teachers with years of experience.

Keever notes many Pennsylvania districts are cutting elective courses, advanced-placement classes, full-day kindergarten or hiking class sizes.

"So all of these factors are making it a very tough job market for teachers in the state right now," he said.

The Bethlehem Area School District was one of the few Lehigh Valley school districts hiring a large crop of teachers this summer. They received more than 1,200 applications for 20-some full-time elementary school teaching jobs.

Virginia's teacher preparation programs do not produce enough new teachers annually to fill the vacancies that open up, said Charles Pyle, spokesman for the Virginia Department of Education. And while Virginia districts have faced budget constraints in recent years, most have avoided cutting positions.

"It is not enough to meet the demand," Pyle said. "We have to look outside the borders of the commonwealth.

"The challenge here is having the teachers you need to begin a new school year."

Pay generally less

Teaching in Virginia generally pays less. Teachers are not members of collective bargaining units, though some are affiliated with the National Education Association or similar groups.

Pennsylvania ranked 12th nationally in 2011-12 with an average teacher salary of $60,760, according to the National Education Association. Virginia, which does not have collective bargaining for teachers, clocks in at $48,761 or 30th.

The 2012-13 annual salary report put out by state officials in Virginia estimates the average teacher salary for fiscal year 2013 will be $52,561. The survey notes it uses a slightly different calculation than the education association.

"They don't put in the 30 years in one (Virginia) school like they do up in Pennsylvania," Widmer said.

Widmer's school division pays new teachers with a bachelor's degree $37,620 a year. That is about $10,000 less than a college friend she graduated with that teaches in nearby Maryland.

Widmer isn't put off by the lower salary, or that it takes time to earn tenure in Virginia. After one interview, she was hired quickly. She now has her own classroom, is a short drive from home and she really likes Culpeper.

"It's a great opportunity," she said. "You get the experience and you gain so much more than substituting in Pennsylvania for five or six years."
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TOP TEACHING JOBS IN VIRGINIA

Virginia, with 132 school divisions, annually determines the top 10 critical teacher shortage areas. For 2013-14, special education, elementary education and middle education round out the top three, ahead of traditional shortage areas like career and technical education and math.


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