Teacher retention is up in Missouri, but there's still work to do

There are tremendous challenges teachers face each day in the classroom, but there are also significant rewards.

This week as part of the Sense of Community series, we present “Why I Teach.” You’ll hear from eight teachers in a variety of grades, sharing their stories about why they chose to go into education, what their joys and struggles are and more.

We start by taking a look at Missouri’s teacher retention rate — in other words, how well school districts keep their teachers from one year to the next. A good teacher retention rate is important not only for school districts, but also for students.

A report by the Learning Policy Institute states that “the cost of attrition to student learning and district budgets is significant. Teachers are the number one in-school influence on student achievement.”

Paul Katnik, the assistant commissioner for the Office of Educator Quality at the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, or DESE, said a report by DESE in December showed that despite declines in teacher retention over the last few years, this January, they saw some improvement.

“We have four groups that we look at," Katnik said. "One has teachers who have six years or more of experience. The retention rate for that group improved by 0.8%. Then we do the retention rate of teachers with five years and less experience, and that improved by 1.8%. And then we also do the retention of all teachers, no matter how long they've been in the profession. And that improved by 0.6%. So three of those four groups showed improvements.”

Missouri continues struggling to keep first-year teachers. That rate dropped to 81.9% last school year from 83.6% the year before.

Katnik said the state saw improvement in keeping teachers in the same district.

This year, there was a 5.3% decrease in the hiring percentage, according to Katnik, which means districts are hiring fewer teachers.

“That 5.3% is anywhere around 500 less positions that had to be filled this current year versus the year before," he said, "so some signs that the workforce is staying put a little bit longer than they were before.”

Missouri’s overall retention rate for the 2023-2024 school year was 88.7%. That compares to 88.2% from the year before. The state’s three-year retention rate is 64.2%.

Teacher retention rates vary from district to district. For example, in Springfield Public Schools, the three-year retention rate is 45.5%, in Nixa, it’s 62%, in Ava the rate is 69.4% and in Willard, the three-year teacher retention rate is 64.7%.

According to a recent report from DESE, many effective teachers are leaving their classrooms, and fewer candidates are entering the field. It points to things such as negative perceptions of the profession and worsening working conditions as some of the reasons.

Katnik explains why he believes Missouri’s retention rate is up this year.

"A lot of school districts have taken steps to address working conditions, and they're doing surveys with staff, you know, to find out what would help them most," he said. "So I think there's things like that, steps like that, that people are taking — that teachers feel like they're a little, maybe a little more supported than they were or, if nothing else, that, you know, that we're all aware of how difficult teaching has become over the last four years, and we're trying to figure out what we can do to help them."

Things like teacher pay can also play a significant role in a school district keeping its teachers.

Average teacher pay in Missouri is $55,639 compared to the state’s annual mean wage of $57,580, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

And that also varies widely by district. For example, in Springfield, average teacher pay is $55,668; in Billings, it’s $39,806, and in Ozark, average teacher pay is $53,025.

Missouri has made gains in teacher pay, Katnik says, but he said other states are working to raise salaries as well, including neighboring states like Illinois and Iowa.

“And so we just have to keep in mind that there's a lot of states working on pay, not just us," he said, and we want to be competitive with all those states. We want our state to be the best place to be a teacher so that we get the best, the best quality of teachers that we can provide for our students.”

To help district’s recruit and retain teachers, DESE released the "Teacher Recruitment and Retention Playbook." It provides guidance for school district leaders as they work to keep and attract teachers.

“The release of our own Teacher Recruitment and Retention Playbook provides a vision for the future, shaping how Missouri will address the challenges of the current teacher shortage and ensure a high-quality teacher is available for every student, in every classroom, in every school in our state,” said Commissioner of Education Karla Eslinger in a statement.

But Katnik said it’s not just the state and districts that need to work on keeping teachers in the state and in the profession.

“Everybody has a role," Katnik said. "Parents and community members have a role in making sure we have enough teachers for our classrooms. Legislators have a role. Governor has a role. Our agency has a role. Our ed prep institutions, our 42 prep programs in the state, they play a role. Our community colleges do. Everybody plays a role, and everybody has the same goal. This state gains nothing if we don't have the best teachers in our classroom with our students and has everything to gain if we do.”