Posted on: Friday, August 23, 2002

Yet another headache under new school law

Common sense suggests that having a degree in a particular topic does not automatically make an individual qualified to teach that subject.

The opposite is also true: A person could become a good and effective teacher of a topic without any advanced degrees in the subject at hand. An English major with a minor in political science might turn out to be an effective geography or history teacher, for instance.

But generally speaking, research suggests that specialized training in a topic is important, particularly in secondary and high schools.

For that reason, it is disturbing that Hawai'i has such a large number of secondary teachers not trained in the subject they teach.

According to the Washington, D.C., interest group Education Trust, fully 33 percent of Hawai'i's secondary teachers are not trained — that is, do not have at least a minor — in the subject they teach. The percentage is even higher (39 percent) in high-poverty schools.

That ranking is the sixth-worst in the nation.

The reasons for this lack of "qualified" teachers are various. And certainly some of the "out of discipline" teachers are performing well.

But if the research is to be believed, one key to improving the quality of our school system is to do a better job of matching up qualified teachers and the courses they teach.

But how?

Part of it will be in putting greater emphasis on producing teachers in shortage areas (such as mathematics). This could involve tuition waivers for students willing to train in these fields, recruitment bonuses or other attractions.

We could also look for non-teachers who have the right academic background and give them a crash course in education so they can more quickly get into the classroom.

Another part of the puzzle is our assignment practices. That is, if we had a more aggressive and flexible system of assigning teachers, we would end up with fewer mismatches. This would require consultation with the teachers union, of course. But there is no reason one school should have a surplus of math teachers and another a shortage simply because of teacher preferences in school assignments.

If this were simply a matter of polishing classroom performance, it might not be a major issue. But because of the new federal No Child Left Behind education law, the numbers should be a major concern to school leaders and policy-makers.

By the 2005-2006 school year, the federal law says, all teachers in core academic subjects must meet requirements to be "highly qualified." If we don't meet that standard, a variety of "corrective actions" begin, leading up to complete school takeovers.

It is not entirely clear what "highly qualified" will mean in practice, but it's a good bet it will mean teachers who are teaching in their proper academic field.

No one wants Uncle Sam to step in and take control of our schools. Our experience with the Felix Consent Decree for special-education children taught us that.

But unless we start right now to do a better job of matching academic background with classroom assignments, we face an educational train wreck just a few years away.