More students, fewer teachers- it is called austerity
The Teacher Gap: More Students and Fewer Teachers
http://www.epi.org/publication/teacher-gap-students-teachers/
Portside Date:
October 25, 2013
Date of Source:
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Economic Policy Institute
Over the last five years, government employment has dropped by 657,000 as a result of the Great Recession’s effects on federal, state, and local budgets. With kids getting settled back in the classroom this fall, it’s worth considering how much of that drop has hit public K–12 schools.
Of the decline in public-sector employment in the last five years, around 40 percent (258,000) is in local government education, which largely consists of jobs in public K–12 education (the majority of which are teachers, but also included are teacher aides, guidance counselors, and administrators, among others). Over the same period, public K–12 enrollment increased by 1.6 percent. Just to keep up with this growth in the student population, employment in local public education should have grown at roughly the same rate, which would have meant adding 132,000 jobs. Putting these numbers together (i.e., what was lost plus what should have been added to keep up with the expanding student population) means that the total jobs gap in local public education as a result of the Great Recession and its aftermath is around 389,000
Of the decline in public-sector employment in the last five years, around 40 percent (258,000) is in local government education, which largely consists of jobs in public K–12 education (the majority of which are teachers, but also included are teacher aides, guidance counselors, and administrators, among others). Over the same period, public K–12 enrollment increased by 1.6 percent. Just to keep up with this growth in the student population, employment in local public education should have grown at roughly the same rate, which would have meant adding 132,000 jobs. Putting these numbers together (i.e., what was lost plus what should have been added to keep up with the expanding student population) means that the total jobs gap in local public education as a result of the Great Recession and its aftermath is around 389,000
