Jessica Holmberg and Will Flanders:

Teachers are fundamental in supporting and molding the minds of America’s future workforce. Unfortunately, the teaching workforce is experiencing crisis-level shortages. Research estimates that the national gap between supply and demand for teachers will grow to more than 100,000 by 2024. While there are many factors contributing to enrollment declines, one major factor that states could use to alleviate the problem is tackling overly burdensome licensing requirements.

For some time, there has been declining enrollment in educator preparation programs and a high level of new teacher turnover in Wisconsin and the U.S. as a whole. In Wisconsin alone, educator preparation enrollment decreased nearly 30% since 2008, according to a recent analysis.

One of the major problems in getting teachers into the classroom are complex licensing requirements. Every state requires some form of teaching license for teaching in the public-school system. The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) released a report that reviewed the many steps a teaching candidate is required to take before licensure. To begin, all teacher candidates must complete an educator preparation program that traditionally takes four years, but may be less depending on whether the candidate holds a bachelor’s degree or not. During preparation, candidates may be required to maintain minimum grade point averages and pass numerous content-related courses and assessments, among other requirements. In 2018 only 45.3% of candidates in Wisconsin passed the Praxis II Mathematics licensure assessment, even after multiple attempts.