While Anheuser-Busch searches for a substitute for Bud Light, school districts across the country search for substitute teachers.  And, as goes the country, Hartford Public Schools goes even worse.

Data revealed during a recent Board of Education Teaching & Learning Committee meeting shows that like many districts, HPS is struggling to fill not only regular teacher positions, but paraprofessional and substitute teacher positions.

Last year, HPS had an average of 79 special education paraprofessional vacancies per month.  The stated daily “fill rate” for substitute teachers throughout the district was given to be an astonishing and unbelievable low rate of only 15%!  That means that 85% of requests for substitute teachers at HPS are not being met!

A 2022 federal report stated that in respect to substitute teachers, “traditionally, demand has exceeded supply.”  However, said the report, the nation’s supply of teachers and substitute teachers has vanished like beer at a barbecue and some districts are not filling 20 percent of requests for substitute teachers.  They call this 20% unfilled rate a crisis, HPS leadership would raise a mug to that number.

In an attempt to stop the outward flow from the substitute teacher tap, HPS offered a $250 bonus to any substitute teacher who stuck with HPS for 30 consecutive days.  Between 2021 and today, HPS hired 169 substitute teachers, only 45 received that $250 bonus.

Similarly, to quench their thirst for paraprofessionals, HPS dropped the requirement that paras must at least have an associate degree.  From the beginning of this school year to today, HPS hired only 5 paras under the relaxed requirement standard.  That’s like offering free Bud Light and nobody grabs a cup.

Other Connecticut school districts, facing the same para and substitute shortages as HPS, went another route.

Two weeks ago, Waterbury dismissed classes early at one school due to a lack of substitute teachers, ditto in Manchester a week earlier.  In December of 2022, Norwalk Public School officials said that “about 30 percent” of their daily teaching openings are covered by other staff members due to there not being enough substitutes. 

What did these three districts do well in advance of these substitution situations?  They all reached for outside staffing help in the form of ESS Staffing and Management Solutions, who according to HPS, is the “nation’s leading provider of full-service substitute personnel and management solutions to K-12 school districts.”  ESS was hired by Manchester in 2018, by Norwalk in 2019, and by Manchester in 2020, yet today these ditricts are experiencing the situations mentioned above.

What did HPS do this week?  They hired ESS.  Rotsa ruck.

For up to $2.5 million, ESS will recruit, train, and hire “up to” 80 paraprofessionals and “up to” 100 substitute teachers for 10 schools within HPS.  These hires will be ESS employees for 90 days, at which time they may, the good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, transition to HPS employees.

Below is a list of the 10 schools where ESS will be directing new substitute teacher hires, while paraprofessional hires will be district wide where needed:

·         Moylan

·         Capital Prep

·         Weaver

·         Burns Latino

·         Global

·         Bulkeley (both North and South?)

·         Hartford High

·         MD Fox

·         Montessorri Magnet at Batchelder

·         Hartford Magnet Trinity College

ESS claims on their website that they have “perfected the substitute teacher hiring process” and that they “employ creative and innovative means to recruit and hire the best candidates available” (the key word there being “available”).  

Documents available through the Board’s Teaching & Learning Committee agenda for this meeting, show that ESS’ perfection of the substitute hiring process and their creative and innovative means of recruitment looks like a list of recruitment “things to do” which any new UCONN human resource graduate (or the folks at Adams & Knight marketing) could come up with in 10 minutes.

To the recruitment point, HPS Board Member Deristel-Leger asked about ESS’ recruitment methods.   Despite 4 representatives of ESS being present at the meeting, HPS Talent Management head, Chief Curtis, fielded the question without actually talking in detail about recruitment methods.  Ms. Curtis gushed over ESS’ commitment to recruit from within the Hartford community, so that students are more apt to sit before a teacher that looks like them (only bigger). 

To Ms. Curtis’ answer we must raise an eyebrow.  It’s great that HPS/ESS is working to recruit substitutes from within Hartford because, aside from the diversity positivity, I don’t think anyone would want to travel from Bridgeport to Hartford for a regular substitute position.

Also, Hartford Public Schools, its leaders, its teachers, its students, and its Board are all rooted and known to the community, yet they have not been able to leverage that familiarity to become ambassadors and recruiters for substitute teachers within the community.  Yet a company from New Jersey is expected to come in and convince the Superintendent’s neighbor to become an HPS substitute teacher.  Rotsa Ruck.

Assuming ESS shanghais a potential sub or para’s interest in working at HPS, undoubtedly, they will have to answer the question, “how much are you paying?”  The answer may depend on who is doing the answering as ESS’ presentation at the meeting, the Superintendent’s approved presentation at the meeting, and the Superintendent’s approved website all make that information as clear as a glass of Guinness.

Below are images of the presented rates which ESS and HPS would pay substitutes and paraprofessionals: