Teacher quality impacts student achievement more than any other school-based factor. For example, students in Tennessee schools with an “F” letter grade are seven times more likely to be taught by teachers on emergency credentials than students at “A” schools. Because of this, it is crucial that Tennessee ensure all students have access to qualified teachers. Fears of teacher shortages loomed nationally directly following the COVID-19 pandemic. Five years later, it is important for advocates to understand the state of Tennessee’s teacher workforce. The following explores the most recent state-level data that illustrate these trends.
Definitions:
Vacancy: A teaching position that has not been filled by a licensed teacher for 20 or more days, excluding emergency credentials; resulting in a substitute, lack of course availability, or students being distributed among existing classrooms, increasing the student to teacher ratio. Vacancies are self-reported by school districts.
Permit: An emergency credential for an individual without a teaching license. Not permissible for special education or early childhood education (ECE).
Endorsement exemption (waiver): An emergency credential for a licensed teacher, allowing them to teach outside their endorsement area(s). Not permissible for special education or courses with end-of-course exams (EOCs).
Emergency Credential: Permits and endorsement exemptions together can be referred to as emergency credentials.The number is generated by the Tennessee Department of Education based on the number of these credentials that were awarded.
1. From 2021 to 2024, the number of teaching positions not filled by a properly credentialed teacher nearly tripled.
The number of teaching emergency credentials issued in Tennessee continued a steady growth trajectory since 2021. The number of vacancies remained around 1,000, or 1.5% of positions, in 2021, 2022, and 2023. However in 2024, the number of vacancies grew by 42%. That year, 2% of Tennessee’s teaching positions were vacant (1,434). To put this in context, a content area is considered to have a critical shortage when 2.5% of teaching positions are vacant. While it’s possible that changes in how the self-reported vacancy data are collected may contribute, this stark trend remains concerning. By 2024, 7.8% of teaching positions in Tennessee’s traditional public schools were vacant or emergency credentialed. Only one in four administrators reported having a sufficient pool of qualified applicants for open teaching roles at their school that year. Tennessee district leaders have reported dealing with vacant positions through various measures such as long-term substitutes, combining classes with a substitute, getting creative with school schedules such as having teachers rotate to get all students covered, not offering certain courses, and other case-by-case solutions. To increase licensed teachers, districts have supported permitted teachers to become licensed, utilized Grow Your Own partnerships that offer teacher apprenticeships at no cost to candidates, and contracted with companies that provide live virtual teachers.
National trends demonstrate that vacancies and underprepared teachers tend to be concentrated in schools with high enrollment of students of color, and that achievement gaps between students of color and white students are largely explained by inequitable access to high quality teachers. There isn’t publicly available data that can show access to qualified teachers by race in Tennessee. However, there is data1 showing that students at high poverty schools were three times as likely to have an emergency credentialed teacher than students at low poverty schools in 2024.
2. Secondary science and secondary world languages, followed by English as a second language (ESL) had the largest proportion of positions that were vacant or filled by a teacher on an emergency credential.
The percent of elementary education positions that were vacant doubled in just one year, from around 0.6% in 2023 to 1.4% in 2024. Pre-k (5%), special education (3.6%), secondary world languages (3.3%), and English as a second language (ESL) (2.9%) all had vacancy rates above the critical shortage threshold (2.5%). Permits are not allowed in pre-k, and neither permits nor endorsement exemptions may be issued in special education. Still, the 2024 rate represents a concerning 2 percentage point increase in Pre-K vacancies in one year2. Encouragingly, ESL vacancy rates decreased by around .4 points since 2023–though still not enough to exit the critical shortage list.
Shortages have persisted nationwide for many of these areas. For example, special education staffing issues have been severe and pervasive for as long as these positions have been required. Over half of public schools nationwide reported that they would need to fill special education positions ahead of the 2024-25 school year, while special education program completers have declined since 2012. These positions may be hard to fill due to the uniquely challenging working conditions including higher workloads and increased non-instructional tasks (developing Individualized Education Plans, coordinating students’ services, supporting other educators who teach students with disabilities) compared to other classroom teachers. Challenges finding math and science teachers have also persisted. A major driver of this trend is that students who majored in science and math earn lower salaries as math and science teachers than in other positions relevant to their degrees. In Tennessee, teachers overall earned 27.6% less than their similarly educated, non-teaching counterparts.
3. The need for more credentialed teachers grew the most in the Southwest region and in rural districts.
The proportion of vacant or emergency credentialed positions grew the most in the Southwest/Memphis region, where rates were already the highest: an increase from 8.8% in 2021 to 19.3% in 2024. The Southwest region staffed 17% of Tennessee teachers in 2024, but 47% of the state’s emergency credentialed teachers, and had 31% of the state’s vacancies. The percent of students who are Black and who are economically disadvantaged is higher in the Southwest region than statewide. Mid Cumberland, home to Nashville and its neighboring counties, also faced growing staffing challenges. The region saw its vacancies grow by 377 since 2021. By 2024, the region staffed a third of Tennessee’s teachers, but had half of the state’s vacancies. A larger proportion of students in Mid Cumberland are Hispanic than statewide.
For the first time since vacancy data has been reported, rural districts had the largest numbers of teacher vacancies of any locale type in Tennessee. In just one year, the number of rural vacancies more than doubled: from under 300 to over 600. This is a stark change from previous years, when vacancies were concentrated in urban districts. Rural district leaders face unique challenges in recruiting and retaining enough qualified teachers. Geographic isolation results in fewer applicants and partnerships with educator preparation programs. Smaller rural tax bases pose challenges in raising funds that might elevate teacher salaries or fund high quality school resources. Most of Tennessee’s rural district leaders don’t believe that their district has access to enough effective teachers to support students, and don’t believe Tennessee’s teacher pipeline is producing enough effective educators.
4. Graduates of teacher preparation programs are declining.
The number of new graduates from educator preparation programs (EPPs) has decreased by 26%, or 1,044 graduates, since 2020. This is an important factor in the future health of the teaching force. New teachers’ pathways into the profession have been changing over time. Between 2013 and 2023, interest in education careers declined among Tennessee high school students. During that time, the share of interested high schoolers who were Black declined, while the share who were Latino increased. To streamline the process of becoming a teacher, the Tennessee State Board of Education may soon adopt rules removing the edTPA as a statewide requirement from candidates in all teacher preparation pathways, replacing it with more robust clinical practice requirements. Adopted as a requirement in 2019, the edTPA is a performance-based assessment where teacher candidates demonstrate their understanding of teaching and student learning through the submission of lesson plans, videos of teaching, rationales, and reflections.
On the 2024 Tennessee Educator Survey, 49% of new teachers reported that they decided to enter the profession after earning an unrelated degree or after working in another field, up from 44% in 2023. Research within the state has shown that teachers of color are over-represented in this group of late-joining teachers, compared to white teachers. As such, the share of teachers who enter through non-traditional pathways such as job-embedded and residency programs has increased in recent years, especially amongst teachers of color. 2023 was the first year that as many as half of new Tennessee teachers were over 30 years old. These trends highlight the importance of expanding access to high quality educator preparation programs for individuals in any stage of adulthood. This year, EdTrust-Tennessee supported HB 504/SB 682, which will expand eligibility for Tennessee’s Future Teacher Scholarship to students who already have a four year degree.
5. The proportion of teachers who were Black increased, though more work must be done to ensure teacher demographics reflect Tennessee student diversity.
In 2024, 11.1% of Tennessee’s teachers were Black–an increase from the 10.2% of teachers in 20233. This makes it more likely that Black students in Tennessee will have the opportunity to learn from a same-race teacher, which has been shown to increase the likelihood of taking advanced classes, entering gifted programs, graduating from high school, and attending college. This increase was recorded following the 2021 adoption of Tennessee’s Educator Diversity Policy, which promoted efforts to collect and analyze data, strengthen recruitment, and improve retention of minority teachers. More work should be done for Tennessee’s teachers to match student racial and ethnic diversity. For example, 24% of Tennessee K-12 students are Black4–much larger than the share of Black teachers. Recent research found that only around one in ten Latino and Asian Tennessee students ever have a same-race teacher in third through eighth grades.
Increasing the number of teachers of color requires intentional preparation, hiring, and support to overcome unique barriers that teachers of color face in preparation for and retention in the classroom. Some teacher candidates of color in Tennessee reported feeling isolated or unsafe on campus in their educator preparation programs. 40% reported that the cost of higher education was a limiting factor. Growing the pool of licensed educators of color would not only increase the chances that students learn from same-race teachers, but would also contribute major relief to the growing statewide teacher shortage by including a traditionally underrepresented group of potential teachers. However, recent attacks at the federal and state levels to diversity, equity, and inclusion programs have resulted in legislation that threatens the Educator Diversity Policy. EdTrust-Tennessee and the Tennessee Coalition for Truth in Our Classrooms opposed this and any other legislation that would deprioritize supporting teachers of color throughout the teaching pipeline.
Questions for Advocates
- In the years following the COVID pandemic, Tennessee introduced programs to bolster the teacher workforce, such as offering free additional endorsements for licensed teachers in special education and in teaching English as a second language, as well as allowing retired teachers to return to the classroom while receiving retirement benefits. However, neither of these programs will be available by the 2025-26 school year. Given the deepening nature of the teacher shortages, what policies and practices can advocates uplift that will result in lasting solutions to teacher pipeline challenges?
- Teacher shortages are highly localized. 63 Tennessee districts reported zero vacancies, and 11 of those districts also didn’t use any emergency credentials in 2023-24. How can advocates collaborate with local district and school leaders to understand and respond to the unique staffing needs in their communities?
- Having at least one same-race teacher increases the likelihood that Black students enroll in college by 19%. At the same time, a college degree is required in order to become a teacher. How can state and local leaders ensure that students have access to teachers that reflect their own identities?
Data notes
- Where a year is reported, it refers to the calendar year of the spring semester of that school year. For example, 2024 refers to the 2023-24 school year.
- Vacancy data is self-reported via an online form. Vacancy data were collected via one-week snapshots as follows:
- 2020-21: a one-week snapshot in October 2020.
- 2021-22: a one-week snapshot January 2022
- 2022-23: end of semester collection based on a one-week snapshot from December 2022 and May 2023. The number of vacancies (1,009) remained unchanged between the fall-only report and the full-year report, suggesting May data may not have been included.
- 2023-24: One week snapshot, May 6-10, 2024
Because emergency teaching credentials are granted by the Commissioner of Education, statewide data on permits and endorsement exemptions are updated throughout the year. The TDOE presentation on the 2022-23 school year only reported emergency credentials for the fall semester (2,888 emergency credentials). The presentation for 2023-24 included the final total of emergency credentials for the 2022-23 school year (4,272 emergency credentials). However, we don’t have full-year breakdowns by endorsement area, geography, etc. for the 2022-23 school year, which makes it impossible to make full-year comparisons based on those breakdowns.
- Educator Experience and Licensure Data, 2023-24
- In 2022-23 and earlier, the shortage area was referred to as “early childhood.” While many districts use “early childhood” and “pre-K” interchangeably, it’s possible that districts had responded to the self-report question in reference to the pre-K through third grade band which can collectively be referred to as “early childhood” in 2022-23.
- 2023-24 and 2022-23 District level Educator Race and Ethnicity data
- 2024 District-level profile data file
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