{"id":344201,"date":"2025-10-30T23:01:23","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T23:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/344201\/"},"modified":"2025-10-30T23:01:23","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T23:01:23","slug":"philadelphia-education-leaders-encourage-more-teenagers-to-pursue-teaching","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/344201\/","title":{"rendered":"Philadelphia education leaders encourage more teenagers to pursue teaching"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sign up for Chalkbeat Philadelphia\u2019s free newsletter<\/a> to keep up with the city\u2019s public school system.<\/p>\n

Why does Philadelphia have a teacher shortage? Monika Shealey hears one answer a lot. <\/p>\n

People often tell Shealey, the dean of the College of Education and Human Development at Temple University, that young Philadelphians \u2014 particularly young Black and brown people \u2014 simply don\u2019t want to become educators.<\/p>\n

But on Thursday, Shealey told more than 200 Philadelphia high schoolers visiting Temple\u2019s campus to learn about teaching careers that she believes otherwise.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou are throwing that narrative out the window,\u201d Shealey said at the Youth in Education Summit. \u201cLet that be the story of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Philadelphia struggles to retain and recruit teachers, education groups and leaders are doubling down on initiatives to inspire Philly teens to embark on careers in education. <\/p>\n

In recent years, the district has begun the school year with hundreds of vacancies<\/a>, and the number of graduates from teacher training programs in the state has plummeted<\/a>. <\/p>\n

There\u2019s a particular shortage of Black male educators, who make up less than 10% of district teachers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea is that we want to increase the number of students and programs in what we call the \u2018early pipeline\u2019 space,\u201d said Scott Gaiber, deputy chief of talent initiatives at Elevate 215, a local education advocacy group that helped organize the Thursday event.<\/p>\n

The organization is part of a coalition of groups across the city to try to improve teacher recruitment. That coalition, the Philadelphia Citywide Talent Coalition<\/a>, championed the district\u2019s first career and technical education program for K-12 teaching, which launched in 2023. Since then, the coalition has also supported other initiatives at Philadelphia schools meant to increase students\u2019 interest in teaching, like Thursday\u2019s conference.<\/p>\n

The students at the event are involved in different teacher training programs. Students from nine high schools participated, joining workshops on issues like how to apply for college teaching programs and what it\u2019s like to be a Black or brown educator.<\/p>\n

To Gaiber, the challenge is clear: even when young people say they\u2019re interested in becoming teachers, several obstacles can derail them from ultimately becoming certified. For one thing, schooling is expensive. And getting a certification often requires overcoming bureaucratic hurdles. <\/p>\n

The hope, he said, is that extra programming and \u201ccreating a supportive ecosystem\u201d can lower those barriers and ultimately lead to a better-trained and more representative teacher workforce, even if the results won\u2019t be evident for years.<\/p>\n

For Elizabeth Melendez, a junior at Esperanza Academy Charter School who attended the event and helped lead a workshop for her peers, working with kids helped her confirm her interest in teaching. <\/p>\n

Every week, she helps out with a class of first graders through an internship program at Esperanza. <\/p>\n

\u201cI know what I want to do now,\u201d said Melendez. She said she plans to study child psychology and become a school psychologist.<\/p>\n

Students learn about teaching through hands-on opportunities<\/p>\n

Parkway West High School Principal William Brown said he knows many students are skeptical of becoming educators. Maybe they\u2019ve heard that they could make more money doing something else, or they\u2019re not sure if it interests them.<\/p>\n

But he said he\u2019s seen through the school\u2019s early childhood career and technical education program that students often develop an interest in education once they\u2019re exposed to it. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so important that the students get that hands-on experience,\u201d said Brown.<\/p>\n

Last school year, Brown worked with Philadelphia Academies Inc. to launch a program at his school meant to increase the number of Black and Brown male educators. <\/p>\n

Students in the program first learn about the history of education in the U.S. and pedagogical best practices. Then they become student-teachers in the middle school that shares the building with Parkway West, earning a stipend for their work.<\/p>\n

He said he believes the program has made a difference for his students. \u201cA lot of our boys, especially, are taking their futures more seriously,\u201d said Brown.<\/p>\n

\"TwoAmyha Watson, 16, left, and Meli Jimenes-Jaques, 17, said learning about teaching jobs made them more interested in careers in education. (Rebecca Redelmeier \/ Chalkbeat) <\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s Temple event wasn\u2019t a magic wand. By the end of the morning, some students in the halls said they still didn\u2019t feel convinced that working in education was for them. <\/p>\n

But others said the sessions had a real effect on how they pictured their future.<\/p>\n

Meli Jimenes-Jaques, 17, said that as a senior at Olney High School, she knew she would soon have to decide what she would do after she graduated. She was interested in working with kids but she didn\u2019t know if she should look into teaching or something else. But after hearing more about the career path of a teacher, she said she felt excited about applying for education programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore I wasn\u2019t as sure,\u201d said Jimenes-Jaques. \u201cBut after seeing all these people and hearing all their voices and their thoughts as well, it really just, like, cemented the fact this is really what I want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rebecca Redelmeier is a reporter at Chalkbeat Philadelphia. She writes about public schools, early childhood education, and issues that affect students, families, and educators across Philadelphia. Contact Rebecca at rredelmeier@chalkbeat.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sign up for Chalkbeat Philadelphia\u2019s free newsletter to keep up with the city\u2019s public school system. Why does…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":344202,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,169393,169392,21248,169394,1448,2830,1311,18823,67016,84753,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,169395],"class_list":{"0":"post-344201","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-amyha-watson","10":"tag-career-in-teaching","11":"tag-high-school-students","12":"tag-meli-jimenes-jaques","13":"tag-pa","14":"tag-pennsylvania","15":"tag-philadelphia","16":"tag-philly","17":"tag-teacher","18":"tag-teacher-shortage","19":"tag-united-states","20":"tag-united-states-of-america","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","23":"tag-us","24":"tag-usa","25":"tag-youth-in-education-summit"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115465610526365704","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344201"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344201\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}