A bipartisan bill aimed at studying and fixing the causes of Colorado’s growing teacher shortage passed the state House on Monday and now heads to the Senate for approval.
House Bill 1003 requires the Department of Higher Education to work with the Colorado Department of Education, school districts and other education associations to identify root causes of the teacher shortage and recommend strategies to recruit and retain more teachers.
Because each area of the state has different needs, the plan will generate unique solutions for rural, urban and suburban school districts, said the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Barbara McLachlan.
“We know the teacher shortage in Colorado has reached crisis mode, so this bill creates the framework to do something about it and bring more teachers to our classroom,” McLachlan said.
In Colorado, there has been a 24.4 percent decline in the number of educators finishing an educator preparation program at colleges and universities between the years 2010-16, McLachlan said.
The shortage is especially felt in high-need areas such as math, science and world languages, officials say, and in rural and remote regions in Colorado.
HB 1003 was one of three bills introduced this legislative session to tackle teacher shortages in Colorado. A bill that would have allowed understaffed rural Colorado school districts to hire unlicensed teachers was killed by its sponsor last week.
House Bill 1176, meanwhile, would allow rural school districts to hire an unlimited number of retired teachers who would be able to collect their entire pension for the year. That bill is still in play.
