Staffing issues keeping school districts on edge

A recent order signed by Idaho Gov. Brad Little pledging $10 million to help pay substitute teachers has shined a light on staffing shortages in state K-12 schools, but whether it will be enough to keep students in classrooms remains to be seen, local districts said.

Last week, Little announced he was allocating the money toward new “substitute teacher recruitment grants” that may be used to provide bonuses to substitute teachers on top of what they already make.

Leaders in local school districts said the money may help shore up substitute teaching, but it’s hard to know exactly how much — particularly for those who are staying home to avoid getting sick.

Potlatch Superintendent Janet Avery said a number of people who regularly sub in her district have said they do not wish to sub until the current surge in new COVID-19 infections subsides. However, she said at the moment, it is still unclear how districts will access these funds.

“Sometimes, if you can offer someone a little bit more money, then they’re more willing to do it — it just depends on their reasons for not choosing to do it,” Avery said. “If it’s truly a safety thing, I don’t know if any amount of money in the world would help.”

Avery and leaders in other school districts said staffing shortages not only in substitute teachers but also “classified” positions like paraprofessionals, custodians and bus drivers have been a problem since before the pandemic. With the added risk of contracting or passing on a deadly disease, they said these shortages have only gotten worse.

“We’ve had to cancel school before because we didn’t have enough staff to continue — and that was pre-COVID,” Kendrick-Juliaetta Superintendent Steve Kirkland said. “It’s been an ongoing issue.”

Avery and her peers in other districts said bus driver shortages in particular have made technical planning more difficult for schools in the region. She said the Potlatch School Board recently voted to raise the pay of substitute bus drivers to help address this problem but if one more of her regular drivers falls ill, they may have to collapse multiple routes into one, “which means kids will be on a bus longer, which we don’t ever want.”

Moscow Superintendent Greg Bailey said his district has already had to cancel some away games for school sports this year because of a lack of bus drivers. School bus drivers have a finite amount of hours they’re able to be on the road in a given timeframe and Bailey said they’ve had to preserve those hours to allow for enough time to drive students to and from the school.

With ongoing staffing shortages in so many areas exacerbated by the pandemic, Bailey and Avery said it’s possible schools may adjust instructional schedules or close completely to in-person instruction simply because there’s not enough staff to serve all students.

“We are trying to keep things together as much as possible,” Avery said. “But if we get to a point that we can’t cover classrooms, that’s another reason we would have to move to an alternate schedule — right now we’re holding it steady.”

“We’re definitely hurting … our goal is to try and keep all of our kids in school,” Bailey agreed. “If we have staff out and we can’t fill the classrooms, then that’s what’s probably going to close us — that or massive amounts of kids out sick. That’s why we’re wearing masks.”

Jackson can be reached by email to sjackson@dnews.com.