As Oklahoma public schools continue to suffer from a teacher shortage, the state Senate passed bills to entice future educators and limit use of uncertified instructors.
Both bills now advance to the state House for consideration.
SB 1614 from Sen. Ally Seifried, R-Claremore, would require uncertified adjunct teachers to have a high school diploma to work in public schools. State law mandates only that they have “distinguished qualifications in their field.”
Seifried’s bill, which passed with no questions nor debate, also would prohibit schools from hiring adjunct instructors as full-time reading or math teachers for kindergarten through fifth-grade classes. State law already prohibits adjunct instructors from teaching the youngest elementary grades.
“As it relates to kindergarten through fifth grade, we need to make sure teachers have the proper training,” she said when passing the bill through committee Feb. 24.
College scholarship funds for aspiring teachers would double under Senate Bill 1546, which passed a floor vote 37-10 on Tuesday. Full-time education majors with fewer than 90 college credit hours would qualify for $2,000 per academic year, up from $1,000, and those who’ve completed more than 90 credit hours could receive $5,000 per year rather than $2,500.
The bill would cost about $10.49 million, according to an estimate from Senate staff and the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education. More than 7,600 students currently receive funds from the scholarship, known as Inspired to Teach.
The legislation also would rename the scholarship program as NEXT-ED, New Educators for Excellence in Teaching and Education.
Existing rules require recipients to be enrolled in a teacher preparation degree program, and they must pledge to teach in an Oklahoma public school for five years after graduation.
“We want to double it and reimagine it because we’ve seen its effectiveness, but we’ve also seen the limit that it has in terms of the finances,” the bill’s author, Sen. Adam Pugh, R-Edmond, said in a January news conference where he first discussed the idea.
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