School districts across the Ozarks area are using a new website to promote Southern Missouri to teachers, in hopes of alleviating the staffing shortages hitting schools.
Alton R-IV superintendent Eric Allen has noticed a “declining pattern” of new teachers graduating from colleges over the last seven years or so, while established teachers are retiring or leaving for other careers. Whereas previously teachers who were not hired in larger cities would spend a few years in rural areas as an apprenticeship, now even large schools are struggling to staff themselves and the overflow has dried up. Finding staff has become a competition between districts.
“Say we get a teacher from Doniphan, and Doniphan takes one from Van Buren, and Van Buren takes one from Eminence, and Eminence takes one from us. We’re not even better off, you know, it’s like musical chairs,” he explained.
The idea for the Teach in the Ozarks project came to Allen when he realized Alton R-IV had five teachers who had moved to the area from out of state, in the midst of a larger flow of urbanites seeking smaller towns and better costs of living. Allen wondered how many people would respond if the school began promoting the Ozark area.
“Instead of going to South Carolina, or Montana, or New Hampshire, why not come here?” he said.
Southern Missouri is rich in natural beauty and outdoor recreation opportunities, but not all of them are widely advertised, noted Superintendent Richard Sullivan of East Carter R-IV.
“If you’re not from this region, you may not know all of the hidden gems that our area has to offer. You could drive by on 60 and maybe miss a lot of opportunities that you would enjoy as a resident here,” he said.
Allen reached out to 31 school districts in the Ozark region about the project, and two-thirds agreed to participate. They encompass Oregon, Carter, Shannon, Texas, Wright and Howell counties.
Sullivan’s reaction to the “out of the box idea” was a hopeful one.
In the Van Buren R-I District in Carter County, Superintendent Clay LaRue was cautiously optimistic, but unsure if the campaign would pay off. Now he is more certain.
“Nationwide, you’re seeing people move out of these high urban areas, especially the West Coast, trying to relocate to find a cheaper cost of living and realizing what states like Missouri ... can offer,” he said. “I think it’s going to be something that we can sustain.”
In Van Buren, popular teaching positions like PE have dropped from 10 applicants to less than half that on average, while specialized positions such as music or high school math may not even get one.
LaRue’s wife Tricia, marketing director and owner of LaRue Marketing, dove into the project and created their website. She was passionate about the plan because she believed it could work, and she had fallen in love with rural Missouri after moving to Van Buren from St. Louis.
“I’m passionate about the project because we live here and our kids go to school here, and then obviously my husband’s a superintendent,” she said. “So it’s near and dear to my heart, and it’s just something that I could see was a need.”
The site, teachintheozarks.com, features school district bios, testimonies from staff, and statistics about the regional cost of living and average class sizes. It has been up and running for over a month, and while Allen noted it is too early yet for any hires, at least two districts have received out-of-state applications. Sullivan suspects traffic will increase as positions are listed at the end of the school year.
“We haven’t really seen an uptick yet, but we’re just now starting to have positions come open, so we’re anticipating that probably over the next 60 days, (we’ll be) seeing an influx of information from that resource,” he explained.
It will not take much to make the effort a success for schools — according to Allen, even an average of two new teachers per district would be a great help.
“We’re still a little bit on the early side, but I’m hoping we do at least get some positive stuff out of this,” he said. “I don’t think it’s a miracle answer, but I think it’s at least a brick in the wall of trying to find a solution.”