Schools across Virginia are having a hard time finding teachers. And, the lack of teachers in Virginia is causing some schools to take drastic measures.
What happens when your local school division can’t hire their way out of the teacher shortage? For places like Petersburg, Richmond and Newport News, the answer is virtual staffing — essentially online learning. School children are seated at computer terminals in front of a teacher who is web streaming to 25 or 30 students.
Evan Erdberg runs Texas-based Proximity Learning that offers the service at three Virginia school districts.
“We know having a teacher in front of your child is of course the number one option," says Erdberg. "But if you can’t have that, why not have a teacher virtually streamed in live each day who’s highly qualified to lead your child on that instructional journey.”
He says this is the environment these children are living in, a generation of Google natives. But web streaming classes?
That’s a solution to the teacher staffing crisis that Governor Ralph Northam says is problematic.
“Having grown up in a very rural area of Virginia, I’ve had great relationships with all of my teachers," he says. "So we are certainly looking at options. But I think we still need to have teachers in the classrooms.”
The virtual teachers all have Virginia teacher certifications. Most of them are mothers on maternity leave, who are at home while web streaming to students in classrooms.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
