Bringing the Pros Back to School

In a pragmatic and welcome response to California’s teacher shortage, Gov. Wilson has signed into law a measure that allows retired teachers to return to the classroom without losing retirement pay. Armed with this incentive, school districts can lure back veteran instructors to deal with the state’s class-size reduction program, the exodus of stressed-out teachers and an unexpected surge in enrollment.

California colleges and universities graduate 5,000 new teachers each year, but the class-size reduction program created a need for 20,000 teachers last year. More will be needed this year if the governor and Legislature succeed in expanding the program to include kindergarten through the third grade.

Only teachers who retired on or before last July 1 qualify under the program. They can return to the classroom for up to three years without penalizing their pensions. The three-year limit will prevent retirement-age teachers from leaving, then quickly returning to collect salaries and pensions. The old law limited retirees to no more than $17,500 in new earnings before they lost retirement benefits. The relaxation of this restriction could encourage many retired teachers to return to the classrooms with their wealth of experience.

The new law also provides an allocation of $4.5 million for the teacher intern program, which allows college-educated adults to become classroom instructors without taking traditional teacher training courses, with the requirement that they pass the state teacher certification examination, a test of their knowledge of a subject, and take special training. This emergency credentialing program should prove especially valuable in the staffing crisis. The novice teachers, though they have varied career experience, will be mentored by veterans in classroom management and instructional methods.

This measure, sponsored by Assembly members Curt Pringle (R-Garden Grove) and Kerri Mazzoni (D-San Rafael), attracted strong bipartisan support in the state Assembly and Senate. Approval is an indication that both Republicans and Democrats are willing to work together to improve the dismal record of the state’s public schools. Let’s see more of the same.