Local 12 Investigates: Where teachers are leaving public schools the most in the Tri-State
CINCINNATI (WKRC) – Across the US, school districts are feeling the impact of a large-scale teacher shortage, and the Tri-State is no exception.
West Chester native Rachel Immerman is entering her third year as a fourth grade teacher, but has seen a lot of her friends leave the profession in recent years.
"More than just the people that have left, to me, it's the people who think about leaving every day,” said Immerman.
She has previously worked for a national teachers union, and says she’s committed to staying in the profession.
“The friends that call me after school, how it's building up and how they just can't do it anymore. This is their last year," she said.
Immerman is watching what has become a local and national trend.
To find out which local districts are seeing the most departures, Local 12 collected data for Ohio and Kentucky from each state's department of education.
More than 1,300 teachers have left their jobs in Southwest Ohio or Northern Kentucky in 2020 and 2021.
Here are the five Southwest Ohio districts that saw the most teachers leave in 2020 and 2021:
- Sycamore Community: 62
- Northwest Local: 60
- Lakota Local: 42
- Cincinnati Public: 40
- Winton Woods City: 36
Sycamore administrators say their numbers are inflated because they hired temporary instructors for a year to teach online, and then returned to normal staffing in 2022.
But other districts are seeing an impact, including the area's largest, Cincinnati Public Schools.
New CPS superintendent Iranetta Wright says there were more than 160 vacancies in May -- 20 more than normal.
The district scrambled and filled all but a handful of positions as classes began Thursday.
When asked if the issue of teachers leaving has become a crisis, Wright said:
Absolutely it is, and that's why, as a school district, we really have to talk about it. We have to think about what other strategies we can use as a district. You know, there are not a lot of people like me. I'm nearly a 30-year veteran, and I started out as a teacher. I'm a graduate of a college of education, and so, there are not a lot of individuals that are doing that now. So, how do we re-energize? How do we find the necessary support for those who are teaching? It’s a challenge across the country, and one thing we're seeing, as we start digging into the data, is that we have a lot fewer individuals going into education to start with.
Here are the five Northern Kentucky districts with the largest exodus in 2021, ranked by the overall percentage:
- Covington: 58 (21.2%)
- Southgate: 4 (21.1%)
- Newport Independent: 24 (19%)
- Bellevue Independent: 8 (17%)
- Boone County: 252 (16.3%)
Boone County administrators say the numbers are consistent with previous years.
Local 12 called more than a dozen other districts, but administrators either didn’t respond to requests for comment or said their turnover numbers were within normal ranges.
In the past, teachers have told Local 12 they have felt burnout from the added pressures of the pandemic.
In addition, some say they feel disrespected by the increased political discord surrounding education, or are scared by the increase in school shootings like the one in Uvalde, Texas in May.
