No Substitute for Quality - efforts of school districts to hire and retain substitute teachers

School Administrator, Jan, 2001 by Alexander Russo

Another appeal of the automated systems may be that they ease substitutes' fears of being hounded by a teacher or principal to take a vacancy they don't want to accept. With the automated system, says Linda Lambert, who is the substitute teacher coordinator for the 3,000-student Park City, Utah, schools, "No one is trying to coerce them into taking the position. It makes them a little more willing [to be substitute teachers]."

In addition to computerized calling systems, some districts have resorted to electronic mail and the Internet to fill their classroom needs.

Like higher pay and lower hiring standards, automated systems don't always make a real difference. As Hazel Gibbs, executive director of human resources in North Carolina's 9,600-student Chapel Hill-Carrboro City School District, puts it: "Automated systems don't make more people."

A more radical form of outside assistance is hiring a temporary staffing agency to take over the entire process of recruiting, screening, training and placing substitutes.

That is exactly what administrators in Ansonia, Conn., did. Unsatisfied with the number and quality of substitutes that were being generated through traditional means, school administrators in the 2,500-student district decided to give Kelly Educational Staffing a try last spring. Though the district usually needs just six to eight substitutes on a typical day, according to assistant superintendent Susanne Murphy, the school board agreed to a systemwide pilot that was successful enough for the district to commit to the firm this year.

Despite the increased costs, according to Murphy, "the clincher is quality subs, where you need them, when you need them and instant responsiveness to any problems that come up." The district no longer uses the telephone service that had been responsible for daily calling. Several other districts, including Gulfport, Miss., are pleased with the service being provided by outside staffing agencies.

How much of a premium is added on top of the substitutes' daily rates ranges from district to district and company to company. (In addition to Kelly, at least five other firms provide substitute teacher placement services to districts, and more firms are entering the market.)

Edinburgh, Ind., Superintendent Ron Mayes says the contract his district had with Kelly added about 40 percent. That's much more than it cost Gulfport, Miss., Superintendent Carlos Hicks, who reports that his staffing contract costs an added 12 percent. In general, district officials with experience contracting for staff estimate added costs at 20 to 40 percent, not counting personnel and other savings that might come from farming out the task.

Not everyone is willing to pay the tab, however, and some of those who have hired a temporary services agency were not satisfied. In some instances, these districts already had invested substantially in automated systems, and other districts dropped the outside help after the agency failed to generate a promised increase in the pool of substitute candidates. In Edinburgh, Ind., a rural district of 1,000 students, Mayes recommended his board discontinue its contract with Kelly Educational Staffing following a pilot run last spring.