COLLEYVILLE, Texas — North Texas school districts are not immune to the substitute teacher shortage plaguing the country.
“I have been doing this 31, 32 years,” O.C. Taylor Elementary School Principal Lisa Pedevilla said. “I've never seen anything remotely close to this.”
On Friday, Pedevilla said the Grapevine-Colleyville Independent School District needed 147 subs. The district only had 81.
“It makes me sad for the students,” Pedevilla said, sighing. “That's who will pay the price. Our teachers are doing all they can.”
From COVID-related reasons to routine doctors’ appointments, teachers do call out. And recently, there’s nobody to step in, Pedevilla told WFAA. But the students still need to be supervised in the classroom.
“We have the counselor go in. We had the librarian go in. We'll have the principal, assistant principal. We've had people from our central office come and sit in the classroom,” Pedevilla said. “We do all that we can.”
North Texas school districts know they have to stay competitive to attract subs.
In October, Grapevine-Colleyville ISD approved a pay raise for substitutes, Pedevilla told WFAA.
Starting Friday and until Feb. 4, Dallas ISD is paying subs an additional $50 for every day they work for the district.
“There's no cap. They can work every day in that time window and receive the additional $50 for every day that they work,” DISD’s Chief of Human Capital Management Robert Abel said.
There were 230 DISD teachers out due to COVID-related reasons Friday, Abel told WFAA. That’s out of about 10,000 total teachers.
Their substitute pool includes 2,200 people, Abel said. But the district knows they can never have too many.
“We know that our substitutes sometimes work for multiple school districts and this ($50 incentive) is a way to say that we value what you do for our schools and our campuses,” Abel said. “And hopefully you'll choose Dallas ISD over any other surrounding district to substitute.”
Want to sub for Dallas ISD? Send an email to substitute@dallasisd.org. Click here for more details.
Want to sub for Grapevine-Colleyville ISD? Go to their website and click “Employment” in the top right corner.