Nashville's public school district opened its doors this year with a shortage of educational assistants (EAs), which officials attribute to federal laws requiring that EAs at some schools hold a certain professional designation.

June Keel, assistant superintendent of human resources for Metro Nashville Public Schools, told The City Paper after a school board meeting Tuesday that the district has about 75 unfilled EA positions. District-wide, MNPS employs almost 700 EAs, 604 of which are devoted to special education classrooms and students.

"This has been a very, very difficult summer for us in filling these vacancies," Keel said Tuesday. "We're recruiting heavily."

Keel said she believes student and classroom needs are being fulfilled, as vacant positions are being temporary filled by EAs lacking the "highly qualified" designation.

The trouble is not a new issue. A federal No Child Left Behind ruling requires that all educational assistants at Title I schools have the professional designation of "highly qualified." The term "highly qualified" refers to specific educational hours earned, or a specific test that is completed.

Educational assistants can become "highly qualified" by completing the equivalent of two years in college, or by earning the state-mandated minimum score on a standardized test called the ParaPro.

Title I schools are, broadly, schools considered to have high numbers of economically disadvantaged students. Schools with this designation are intended to receive more federal funds and other resources.

Keel said the current EA vacancies are not limited to Title I schools. The district is working to prioritize assignment of EAs based on student and school needs.

"There just aren't enough to go around," she said.

Districts across the country have had to take steps, in recent years, to rearrange their educational assistant staffs. All new hires of paraprofessionals at Title I schools, starting in 2002, had to be "highly qualified," according to Amanda Maynord, deputy public information officer for the Tennessee Department of Education, in a City Paper interview earlier this year.

Districts had until 2006 to complete transfers of existing employees who did not comply with the law's requirements. MNPS, Maynord said, was not able to fully comply with the law by the appointed time, and is still in the process of fulfilling a plan to reach full compliance. The state Department of Education is monitoring that process.

Differentiated pay plan successful

Keel, also on Tuesday, credited a recently established differentiated teacher pay plan for playing a role in narrowing teacher vacancies at MNPS in the hard-to-fill areas of math and special education. MNPS started the school year Monday with about 20 vacant teacher positions, Keel said.

That's about the same amount as last year, she said, but there is a difference in subject areas represented. This year, five vacancies are in special education and three in math. Vacancies last year were more concentrated in these areas, as well as in science.

"We really had a large number of math and science vacancies, and special [education] vacancies, last year," Keel said. "This year, they're more scattered across the board, and I feel very confident that we're going to have them filled."

Keel attributed the change to the new differentiated teacher pay plan, which awards signing bonuses to teachers in the areas of math, special education, and English language learning.

Source: nashvillecitypaper.com