Utah needs to find 44,000 teachers

An idea is being pitched on Capitol Hill: Hire 1,000 new teachers and give them — and all others already on teaching staffs — $1,000 bonuses.

The proposal and its $80 million price tag sounds like a tall order.

But a Utah State University study shows it's an understatement of a looming teacher shortage.

Utah schools will need to hire more than 44,000 new teachers by 2014, according to the Utah Education Supply and Demand Study 2004-05, submitted Friday to the Utah Board of Education.

That's more than 6,000 teachers a year in the latter part of the decade.

It's anyone's guess where they'll come from.

Teaching colleges are growing, but the number of graduates churned out since 2000 isn't. Numbers even dipped between 2003 and 2004, the study states.

Just more than half of those graduating from teaching colleges take jobs in Utah classrooms. Half the new teachers quit in the first five years. And Utah has more than 12,500 Utahns sitting on their teaching licenses rather than putting them to use.

"We see what's coming down the mountain," said Byron R. Burnham, professor and head of USU's instructional technology department, who authored the study with professor Nicholls Eastmond and graduate student Debora Escalante. "But are we being adequate in our response?"

The study was conducted by USU's Instructional Technology Department for the Utah Office of Education and Utah Board of Regents. It fleshes out previous USU studies on the topic, using a broad range of data from the State Office of Education and Governor's Office of Planning and Budget.

Among findings:

• Utah's school-age population is expected to grow by 28 percent, to 635,800 students by 2014.

• Teacher ranks will need to increase by as much as 23 percent to cover that growth.

• Attrition, just above 6 percent in 2003-04, is expected to exceed 13 percent by 2014.

• More than 46 percent of today's teachers will become eligible for retirement in the next decade.

• Of 8,960 graduates receiving Utah teaching licenses between 2000 and 2004, just 49 percent were teaching in the 2004-05 school year.

• Nearly 31 percent of teachers reportedly left because they retired or moved away, and 15 percent left or switched career fields.