Dear AAS Members, and citizens of the State of Alabama. Please take a moment to read this great newsletter that highlights the national efforts of science educators to create the next generation of scientists. Enjoy!
Alabama Academy of Science (AAS) Position Statement on the establishment of the Teachers Excellence and Accountability for Math and Science (TEAMS) Program Press Release: For Immediate Release
ALABAMA ACADEMY OF SCIENCE, INC
Alabama Academy of Science (AAS) Position Statement on the establishment of the Teachers Excellence and Accountability for Math and Science (TEAMS) Program
AAS Recommendation for Funding HB 537, SB 327
Currently in Alabama there are about 7,500 positions for math and science teachers, but only about 4,600 of those are filled by educators with credentials in those subjects. This is not just an issue for Alabama but is prevalent nationwide. Current educational thought holds that the pivotal reason behind failing schools is the inability for schools to staff classrooms with qualified teachers this being especially true in the fields of math and science.
On March 31, 2021, the AAS Executive Committee voted to recommend and support the Alabama State Department of Education to establish the Teacher Excellence and Accountability for Mathematics and Science (TEAMS) Salary Schedule Program; to provide additional compensation to teachers of mathematics and science who elect to participate in the program and meet the required qualifications; to provide an additional annual supplement to program participants teaching in hard-to-staff schools; to create the TEAMS Fund in the State Treasury; and we do not support the terms of employment for participating teachers.
However, we have reservations in our support of a program that takes away teacher tenure of qualified educators, the benefits of the bill as written outweighs theoretical loss. The AAS would also propose the establishment of TEAMS as a mechanism for stimulating additional teacher engagement through stipends for extracurricular science teacher coaching for participants in Science Fair, Science Olympiad, Science Paper Competitions (AJAS & Gorgas Scholarships), Robotics (BEST and VEX), etc..
The actual proposed salary schedule, and what regions are considered hard to staff are missing from the bill as are all of the requirements for eligibility that a participating teacher would have to meet. Clarifying what is proposed and creating a more inclusive environment would have greater success for increasing the number of math and science teachers available for the program.
We urge the State Legislature to move forward on the funding of TEAMS for the 2021-2022 budget year after addressing the reservations of AAS. We respectfully request State School Superintendent Dr. Eric G. Mackey to give full consideration for the development of this program to be included in the strategic planning initiatives underway.
Establishing the Teacher Excellence and Accountability for Mathematics and Science (TEAMS) Salary Schedule Program is integral to Alabama’s future!
If further information is needed, please contact us.
Jack Shelley-Tremblay, PhD
President, Alabama Academy of Science
Ellen Buckner, PhD, RN, CNE, AE-C, Samford University
Alabama Academy of Science, Chair, Gorgas Scholarship Competition
Larry Krannich, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry, UAB
Executive Director, Alabama Academy of Science
Virginia Vilardi, PhD, Elmore County Schools
Alabama Junior Academy of Science, State Science Fair Director
Mark T Jones, PhD, Nationally Certified
ACS B Science Olympiad Coordinator and Community Founder
Alabama Junior Academy of Science State Director
The following is supportive documentation for establishing the Teacher Excellence and Accountability for Mathematics and Science (TEAMS) Salary Schedule Program by the State Department of Education.
- From the Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (https://amte.net/issue/2016/12/math-teacher-supply-demand-and-shortages-us)
One of the five major factors that influence teachers’ decisions to enter, stay in, or leave the teaching profession and related recommendations.
- Salaries and other compensation
- Teachers’ salaries are not competitive with other professions; many salaries are too low to support a middle-class existence. Even after adjusting for the shorter work year, beginning teachers earn about 20% less than their peers.
- For teachers in high-demand fields such as mathematics and science, salary differences between teaching and other jobs available to them are particularly important.
- “[T]he best-paid teachers in low-poverty schools earned 35% more than their counterparts in high-poverty schools” (p. 10).
- States that have raised and equalized salaries have solved shortages.
- Report recommends increasing teacher salaries, as well as overall compensation by offering housing incentives. Also recommends providing low-income schools with additional resources to attract and retain high-quality teachers (focus on equitable distribution of resources)
- From the Alabama Daily News ( https://www.aldailynews.com/lawmakers-look-at-teacher-shortage-colleges-of-education/ )
MONTGOMERY, Ala. – Alabama’s teacher shortage crisis was the central topic during the Alabama House’s Ways and Means Education Committee meeting on Thursday. It was the first public meeting to discuss 2021 education budget appropriations and issues in the upcoming legislative session.
Jim Purcell, the executive director of the Alabama Commission on Higher Education, presented data on Alabama’s teacher workforce and ways to attract and retain more teachers.
Since 2010, there’s been a 40% decrease in students entering state teacher education programs. Meanwhile, 8% of educators leave the profession each year.
According to ACHE data, 71 percent of new teachers are working in Alabama one year after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in education. Purcell said this was a good sign for fixing the teacher shortage crisis.
“We can address education shortage if we target that population because they are going to stay in the state and they are going to benefit from that,” Purcell said.
Five years after they graduate, those working in Alabama with education degrees decreases to about 66%.
Currently, 30% of Alabama classrooms are taught by “out of field” teachers with no background in the subject they are teaching.
Math and science teachers are among the most sought. In 2018, the state approved a program to help repay up to $5,000 a year in federal student loans for certified math and science teachers who teach in critical shortage areas. Unfortunately, Purcell said, there are currently only 45 students taking advantage of that program and only four of them are serving in high-need areas.
“We may want to think about expanding it to encourage existing teachers to go and get a degree because it’s currently based on the first degree that they get,” Purcell told the committee.
Giving an extra bump in salary to those teaching math and science was another suggestion from Purcell.
The Alabama Teacher Shortage Task Force recommended 23 different proposals to the State Board of Education in October on how to recruit and retain more teachers. They included increasing teachers’ salaries; creating scholarships to encourage students to choose a career in education; providing significant incentives for certified teachers to teach in high need areas; and utilizing veteran teachers in recruiting the next generation of teachers.
Teachers are included in Gov. Kay Ivey’s goal of adding 500,000 newly trained and skilled workers to the state by 2025.
- From the Economic Policy Institute
(https://www.epi.org/publication/the-teacher-shortage-is-real-large-and-growing-and-worse-than-we-thought-the-first-report-in-the-perfect-storm-in-the-teacher-labor-market-series/)
- Schools struggle to find and retain highly qualified individuals to teach, and this struggle is tougher in high-poverty schools (report #2). A dwindling pool of applicants and excessive teacher attrition make staffing schools difficult. With the number of students completing teacher preparation programs falling dramatically, and with significant rates of attrition and turnover in the profession, it should be no surprise that schools report difficulties in hiring and, in some cases, do not hire anyone to fill vacancies. The difficulties are greater in high-poverty schools. The share of schools that are hiring, the difficulty in filling vacancies, and the share of unfilled vacancies all increased in the past few years.
- Low teacher pay is reducing the attractiveness of teaching jobs, and is an even bigger problem in high-poverty schools (report #3). Teachers have long been underpaid compared with similarly educated workers in other professions, with a pay gap that has grown substantially in the past two decades. In high-poverty schools, teachers face a double disadvantage, as they are further underpaid relative to their peers in low-poverty schools.
- The tough school environment is demoralizing to teachers, especially so in high-poverty schools (report #4). Teachers report that student absenteeism, class-cutting, student apathy, lack of parental involvement, poor student health, poverty, and other factors are a problem. Larger shares of teachers also report high levels of stress and fears for their safety. The school climate is tougher in high-poverty schools. Relative to their peers in low-poverty schools, teachers in high-poverty schools are less likely to say they intend to continue to teach and more likely to say they think about transferring to another school.
- Teachers—especially in high-poverty schools—aren’t getting the training, early career support, and professional development opportunities they need to succeed and this too is keeping them, or driving them, out of the profession (report #5). The lack of supports that are critical to succeeding in the classroom and the unsatisfactory continued training makes teaching less attractive and impedes its professionalization. Teachers in high-poverty schools devote a slightly larger share of their hours to delivering instruction, and fewer of them have scheduled time for professional development.
Together, these factors, their trends, and the lack of proper comprehensive policy attention countering them have created a perfect storm in the teacher labor market, as evident in the spiking shortage of highly qualified teachers, especially in high-poverty schools. The sixth and final report in the series calls for immediate policy steps to address this national crisis.
- From Teach.com (https://teach.com/careers/become-a-teacher/where-can-i-teach/shortage-areas/)
There will always be a need for great teachers. Regardless of temporary economic conditions, hiring practices, budget cuts or any other factors that impact the education system, the need for teachers is timeless and universal. Society will always need educators, and in that respect, teaching is one career in which you can be confident you will always have a purpose.
A teacher shortage occurs when there are not enough teachers in key subject areas, which has been partly caused by years of teacher layoffs during the Great Recession, a growing student population and fewer people entering teacher preparation programs, according to the Learning Policy Institute .
The need for teachers is quite real. According to the Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2010-2011, employment of teachers is expected to grow by 13% between 2008 and 2018. In 2008, there were about 3.5 million kindergarten, elementary, middle and high school teachers in the country, so we can expect almost another 500,000 to be hired by 2018. Also indicative of the high demand for teachers is the large volume of grants available for teachers.
The specific needs of schools vary from district to district. Some areas, particularly in high-needs schools in the south and west, have higher needs for teachers. There is also a demand for teachers by subject, with certain academic areas needing teachers more than others. Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) education is a great example of an area where there is a high demand for great teachers.
2021 Annual Meeting: Winners and thank you!
Dear Alabama Science Family,
Thank you so much for making this year’s meeting of the Alabama Academy of Science such a great success!
From the professional papers and posters on Thursday, April 18th 2021 to the Awards celebration Thursday night to the AJAS/Gorgas Competitions on Friday, April 19th, the exchange of ideas was outstanding and the science world class!
Please see the winners of the Student competition for this 98th Annual Meeting here!
Please see the Academy honorees for 2020-2021 here!
Please see the Gorgas winners here!
ASEF SPONSORS
Broadcom Coding with Commitment
The Alabama State Science Fair gives special thanks to the Broadcom Foundation, and its innovative Coding with Commitment Initiative.
Check us out of Facebook at Alabama Academy of Science Facebook Page!
Broadcom Coding with Commitment Launches at
ALABAMA SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING FAIR
New Recognition Honors a Student or Student Team that Combines STEM Knowledge with Computational Coding to Address a Community Problem
Broadcom Foundation announces Broadcom Coding with Commitment, a special recognition for a middle school student or student team competing in the ALABAMA SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING FAIR fair.
The Broadcom Coding with Commitment is open to 6th, 7th and 8th grade students or teams in any science fair category who combine STEM knowledge with computation or coding in the project’s research, design, or development to express a passion for helping or improving the community.
The foundation’s new recognition requires judges to consider a student’s access to STEM resources and computing tools so that the judges might equitably weigh projects by all students including those whose access to resources may be more limited.
“The Broadcom Coding with Commitment acknowledges important trends we see in science fair and coding spaces: young people are seeking to solve problems that impact them personally or in their community such as health, sanitation, energy, climate change and other challenges set out in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals,” said Paula Golden, President of the Broadcom Foundation. “Young people are connecting science with technology to research as well as create solutions to these problems. Broadcom Coding with Commitment is intended to illuminate how coding is both a language and skillset they can apply in problem solving, and an invaluable tool for college and careers. Broadcom Coding with Commitment will also encourage young people to think globally when they act locally.”
The winning student or student team will be publicly recognized at the YOUR FAIR Awards Ceremony with a $250 gift certificate and Raspberry Pi Foundation’s Official RP 400 Personal Computer Kit.
Stay connected on Twitter, Facebook andYouTube and YOUR FAIR SOCIAL LINKS.
WHEN: APRIL 9th and 10th
WHERE: LINK
WHO: Virginia Vilardi, Science Department Chair, Wetumpka High School
Jack Shelley-Tremblay, Chair, Department of Psychology, University of South Alabama
Paula Golden, President of Broadcom Foundation
Get involved! Alabama Academy of Science to Host Alabama State Science Fair Finals
Dr. John Shelley-Tremblay, President-elect of the Alabama Academy of Science, is serving as the organizer for this year’s Alabama Science Fair. This is the official culmination of the 2020-2021 Science Fair for the state of Alabama, and the winners from this year’s regional fairs will compete for the chance to go the the International Science and Engineering Fair in the summer of 2021. All of this year’s competitions are virtual due to COVID-19.
According to Dr. Shelley-Tremblay, “The AAS has always provided support and structure for the science fairs in the State of Alabama, and the Director of the Science Fairs, Virginia Vilardi of Wetumka High School, is a Member of the AAS Executive Board. This year, we are particularly excited to take a more direct role in the success of this vital STEM education activity for students in our state by hosting the event online in partnership with the University of South Alabama and Auburn University.”
Every year, individual and business sponsors help to make the State Science Fair a success. This year, in addition to giving using the traditional form (See below), interested donors may sponsor the State Science Fair using the AAS online giving portal. All proceeds will be under the control of the State Science Fair Committee, and will go directly to support prizes for students who are winners at the State Level.
The AAS would like to encourage all citizens of the state and local business that wish to employ highly qualified workers in the STEM disciplines to give as generously as the can. The challenges for completing research projects during COVID-19 are particularly difficulty for middle and high schoolers who are often physically isolated and may be cut-off from their normal research environments and mentors.
Sponsors will be identified on the web site and in all Science Fair Printed materials, unless the sponsor wishes to remain anonymous. Sponsors will be recognized verbally at the opening ceremony and awards ceremony.
You can give by printing and mailing this form,
Or by using this online form.
ASEF questions? Contact Dr. Virginia Vilardi at virginia.vilardi@elmoreco.com (334-799-0104) or Dr, Jack Shelley Tremblay jstremblay@southalabama.edu (251) 460-6883 or: (251) 460-6320