South Cook News

At its June 6 meeting,  the Community Consolidated School District 146 board heard from Jeff Charleston, director of business services, who said the district might have to raise the pay of substitute teachers to keep competitive.

“So as we all know, there’s a sub shortage out there and we have many days where we're short subs and all of that,” Charleston said. “So one of the things we wanted to look at was our sub rates. Are they competitive with area districts?”

“For example, for teachers right now it's $100 a day,” Charleston said. “We’re proposing $150 a day, which is a big increase, but it keeps us competitive. And also it will do things like right now we have to cover shortages with internal subbing, which is actually more expensive than hiring a sub. So raising the rate might in a way lower our overall cost and it keeps us competitive in all that.”

Illinois public schools are having a shortage of substitute teachers as approximately 2,100 teaching positions are open.

One way the state is becoming competitive is by lowering licensing fees.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker passed four bills in April of 2022 to try and help alleviate some of the sub shortages in the state. The first bill lowered the fee for reinstating a lapsed license from $500 to just $50. Other bills lengthened the duration that a short-term sub can teach and lowered the minimum college standards for a substitute teacher. 

The state has created a short-term subbing license in direct response to the shortage. After a short amount of training and a small fee, people can become certified to help in classrooms. Some candidates do have college training, and experience with kids, while others are just looking for work or to help out the schools.

Near the end of the school year in April, 88% of school districts in Illinois were lacking properly certified teachers in all positions, and all but 4% reported a serious lacking of available substitute teachers. More than 5,000 teaching positions went unfilled in the 2021-2022 school year throughout the state.

The State Journal-Register reported teacher shortages have been a problem before the pandemic.