A national teacher recruitment group active in South Carolina is under scrutiny after the state’s Office of Inspector General issued a sharp criticism of the group’s money operation and management, questioning the wisdom of spending public money on the private sector program.
Teach For America was called by the State Board of Education in 2010 to help address staff shortages in schools across South Carolina by recruiting new teachers. It has received $ 23 million in state funding since 2012 – $ 2 million in the first year and $ 3 million in each subsequent year.
SC treasurer Curtis Loftis asked the inspector general at the beginning of last year to evaluate Teach For America, and the December 4 report now prompted Loftis to recommend terminating the state contract with the organization.
“Teach for America has been an expensive failure for students and taxpayers and for the school system in South Carolina,” he told Post and Courier.
Troy Evans, executive director of Teach for America South Carolina, told the inspector general that $ 1.1 million is spent each year on recruitment and placement, with the rest covering teacher training, coaching and retention.
An analysis by the Office of the Inspector General of 2019-20 expenditure revealed that the group spent a total of $ 4.3 million, almost half of which was used for “personnel services”. She paid $ 851,000 in fees, or 20 percent of her total 2019-20 expenses, to the national corporate office in New York in exchange for administrative support.
Teach For America South Carolina also received more than $ 400,000 from partner school districts in 2019-20, intended to cover the cost of teacher placement. These “service fees” were specified in their contracts, but school officials in two state districts told the inspector general that they were unaware that Teach For America received state funding. One employee said it was “almost like paying double,” according to the report.
Evans said he appreciates the assessment and expects greater engagement with the state. He praised his organization’s credentials, arguing that enormous value was built into his methods and background.
Teach For America introduces thousands of young people to careers in education, provides essential support during the first two years in the classroom, and focuses its attention on schools in low-income areas.
“Our hope is that they will fall in love with him and stay,” he said of the new recruits. But even if they don’t, they gain experience and perspective that can help improve education outcomes, said Evan.
He plans to step up recruitment efforts to provide more teachers to schools in South Carolina and thereby cut costs per teacher, he said.
The inspector general’s investigation compared Teach For America’s recruitment record with the state’s Alternative Certification Program for Educators, which has mandated recruits for three years and costs far less than its private sector cousin.
PACE received $ 315,000 in state funding each year between 2016 and 2020. School districts paid nothing. In 2019-20, it certified 384 first-year teachers (and 1,147 in total) at a cost of $ 275 each.
In comparison, Teach For America certified 48 first-year teachers (and 112 in total) at a cost of nearly $ 27,000 each.
“This does not include your salaries,” said Loftis.
Evans argued that “comparing ourselves to PACE is like comparing apples to baseballs.” He said the two programs have different approaches and both are valuable, especially during the continuing shortage of teachers across the country.
“I think you need as many solutions as possible,” he said.
Teach For America was located at 635 Rutledge Ave. in Charleston. But his team is now working remotely because of the pandemic. Andrew J. Whitaker / Staff
Teach For America, founded in 1989, is a non-profit organization with a total annual revenue of about $ 300 million. Functioning somewhat like Peace Corp, she finds her teachers among recent graduates willing to commit for two years working at a low-income school in an effort to “close the opportunity gap”. The program offers an alternative path to careers in public schools that does not initially require regular certification.
The organization has been criticized for installing inexperienced and poorly trained strangers in challenging school environments, for which they are ill-prepared after just five weeks of training, and for displacing better trained teachers. Their retention rates have also been examined, as a significant number of program participants dropped out before they even completed their two-year commitment, according to a 2010 academic study.
Other studies suggest that teachers in the group are responsible for accelerating the learning of mathematics and reading among some young students, and Teach For America says its program has significantly increased the number of people seeking careers in education.
PACE has retained more of its participants (80%) over three years than Teach for America over its two-year program, says the inspector general’s report. Most PACE participants obtain standard certification at the end of their term and less give up teaching at the end of the program compared to Teach For America participants.
In 2019-20, the number of newly hired PACE teachers was 378; the number of newly hired Teach For America teachers was 41, according to the report.
Pastor Thomas Dixon and other African-American civic leaders gathered for a press conference on February 4 in front of the Teach For America office to condemn what they called unfair attacks on school board candidate Kevin Hollinshead during the presidential election. November 2020 and to condemn efforts to undermine public education. (Brad Nettles / Team)
Loftis noted that the state is paying Teach For America 100 times what it is paying the PACE program.
“It costs us a huge amount of money to recruit these teachers, and they don’t stay long,” he said. “PACE recruits many teachers and they stay for a long time.”
He said that the money committed to recruiting teachers could be better spent, and the vacancies almost completely filled, severing ties with Teach For America and investing more in PACE.
He said he is sharing what his office has learned with the General Assembly, which decides whether to fund the nonprofit partner. He expects lawmakers to stop funding the group at the end of this fiscal year, in June.
Review of Inspector General of Teach For America in SC
Teach For America letter to the SC Educational Supervision Committee