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My youngest daughter is having an IMPOSSIBLE time getting a job special ed in our area (northeast Ohio) She graduated two years ago and I encouraged her to sub in the districts that she wants to teach in. Well she did that and managed to latch on to a long term sub (she knew the teacher.) That long term sub job was wonderful and she was very well liked by her co-workers and the principal. In fact her co=workers went to bat for her to the principal. When a job did come up, she didn't even get an interview. It was also posted internally and someone else got it. Ditto for all the other jobs in that district. As of now, she has applied for at least 100 positions. She is not picky. They include paraprofessionals, aides, long term subs and regular special ed teachers. I can count the number of times she even had an interview. And yet, we know of several young friends who were hired immediately out of college, no master degree, no experience. My daughter graduated with honors, minored in psychology, has a reading endorsement and is two classes from her degree in literacy/reading. As a long time Catholic school teacher myself, I have discouraged her from going to a parochial school because of the very low pay. So now it is July and no prospects are in sight. She is applying at a company that contracts with other schools and pays benefits. At least this will give her more experience. But she is so discouraged and so am I. Anyone have any advice? We are at our wit's end here. (By the way, she did practicum at a charter school and will not go back.) Thanks for any and all help.
From Ohio originally and check the jobs back home regularly. If she is special edu certified and can't get a job in Ohio then I hate to say it but she isn't trying very hard. I checked out the ODE website today in fact and counted SEVERAL postings just from this week. This, or she does not interview very well.
OP, something doesn't sound right. As a special ED teacher, I have to say its one of the easiest positions to get and has maybe the best security. Many teaching jobs come by knowing someone. Any position I have gotten either in special ed or other subjects has come from referral or working at a school as a sub and being asked to stay on board.
Your daughter might possibly have severe classroom management problems and might not be aware of it thinking that everybody else is having the same struggle......and perhaps they are but unfortunately were granted tenure.. A lack of Self awareness of how bad some of us are is really lacking in this field which makes it hard for me to support big raises even though I would benefit from it. Almost everyone I meet at work thinks they are this irreplacable, once a generation talent and thats far from the case.
The problem with teaching is that in many cases the credentials are not overly difficult to get. Most programs really do a bad job of weeding people out unlike a law, engineering or medical program, and its not until the person is in action where you actually see they are not a good fit. Perhaps someone has whispered some negative things about her ability. One year I worked in a school with 180 teachers. Due to a loss of students, 90 people got laid off but not one person in the special ED department....why, because often the positions are difficult to fill.
I would suggest moving like others have mentioned, but maybe this is just not the field for her. Typically a Special Ed credential covers grades K-12, and if you can't get hired to teach one of those grades within a 50 mile radius, there's something wrong there. Have a heart to heart and ask her what makes her think she's right for the job. ANd really drill home, does she have complete classroom control, or is the environment a bit of a zoo.
Right now, my daughter is not looking all over the state, just the suburbs around where we live (about 12 school districts.) She has subbed and did a long term sub over spring. She got a very positive review (including organization, discipline, lesson planning and working in a team and small group.) I saw the paperwork myself and know the teacher she subbed for who had nothing but good things to say. The principal talked to her personally and said that the available jobs were internal posts over which she had no control. What the problem is that she can't even get an interview. Whenever she goes for a job (and it has been many) she gets a rejection letter back saying they had 200-300 individuals going for it and they went in another direction. A job opened up in our hometown where she graduated from. They pulled the job after a week (it was supposed to be up for two.) Daughter applied the first day. However, after the week, she got a rejection letter saying it was already filled. What I'm saying is that unless you know someone in this area (and I mean the superintendent or something) it is almost impossible to even get an interview let alone a job.
She will be working for a company that contracts in private schools. This spring she will look long and hard at relocating within the state. But not until then.
Right now, my daughter is not looking all over the state, just the suburbs around where we live (about 12 school districts.) She has subbed and did a long term sub over spring. She got a very positive review (including organization, discipline, lesson planning and working in a team and small group.) I saw the paperwork myself and know the teacher she subbed for who had nothing but good things to say. The principal talked to her personally and said that the available jobs were internal posts over which she had no control. What the problem is that she can't even get an interview. Whenever she goes for a job (and it has been many) she gets a rejection letter back saying they had 200-300 individuals going for it and they went in another direction. A job opened up in our hometown where she graduated from. They pulled the job after a week (it was supposed to be up for two.) Daughter applied the first day. However, after the week, she got a rejection letter saying it was already filled. What I'm saying is that unless you know someone in this area (and I mean the superintendent or something) it is almost impossible to even get an interview let alone a job.
She will be working for a company that contracts in private schools. This spring she will look long and hard at relocating within the state. But not until then.
Why would she limit the search to within the same state? Just curious.
I'm originally from OH and graduated in 2010. I wasn't able to find a teaching job in OH, even with being dual certified in sped and gen ed, minoring in Spanish, and also having a reading specialist endorsement. The job market has been bad for a long time. I'm sure at one point getting a sped endorsement was an easy way to find a job, but the problem is that everyone's been told that for years, and now tons of people are getting certified in sped. I originally wanted to just major in elementary ed and ended up adding my sped endorsement because I was told it would help me get a job. Over half of the students in my college education program ended up signing up for the sped endorsement program.
I got very few interviews in OH and half of them were dishonest about the position available; the schools were trying to get someone for their self-contained severe needs emotional disturbance classrooms. I was only certified mild/moderate and had NO interest in a position like that. Of the people I graduated with; I only know of 2 that got teaching positions in OH. One is a middle school sped teacher and one is a preschool sped teacher for students with severe/profound disabilities. Our major concentration was elementary and mild/moderate disabilities, so both had to go outside of that to get hired. My dad is a sped teacher and last year I went to eat lunch with him at his school one day when I was visiting for Christmas break. I ran into a multitude of teachers my age who were in their very first year after having to put in years in aide and subbing positions. I was in my 7th year of full time teaching!
All this to say, IMO relocating is probably the only option. After applying to hundreds of jobs in OH, I applied to one school in CO and was hired over the phone within one week. She should pick 1-2 states with better job markets that she'd be willing to work in, and work on getting those states licenses ASAP. Most states are reciprocal with OH, so all she'll need to pay is the fee to get the license, which should be under $100 in most cases. I know it seems silly to get a license when you have no offers yet, but this will signal schools from out of state that she is truly ready and willing to move there.
I don't understand how she doesn't have money to relocate- hasn't she been working in some capacity this whole time, and living relatively expense-free at home? I know subbing and whatnot doesn't pay much, but someone who isn't paying rent or many bills doesn't need that much income. For someone her age moving to their first apartment, relocating somewhere else really shouldn't be more expensive than moving into her own apartment locally. I moved with what could fit in my car. I had to pay first and last month's rent, plus a deposit for my apartment, but that would have been true locally as well since I was young and had no credit at the time.
If she truly doesn't even have that much saved up, she needs to work on budgeting and saving. I gradually bought things for my apartment as I got the money to do so. I started with a mattress and camping chair. I didn't buy living room furniture until about 3 months in. Another thing to keep in mind is that it can only be for a year. If she absolutely hates it, she can likely look for positions in OH the following year and have more success with some actual experience on her resume and updated professional references. As a pp pointed out, the further away she gets from graduation with no experience, the more difficult it's going to be to get hired. I was hired the last week of July and had moved by the 2nd week of August. It's not too late to keep looking this year!
Thanks for the input. While my daughter has been living at home rent free, she still has student loans and other expenses (including some serious health concerns that have plagued her since she was very young.) It's hard to get ahead when subbing a few times a week and working in retail.
But the more I read these posts, it seems that relocating is going to have to be a serious option if she wants to teach. With 200-400 applicants for every position, I doubt if she will even get an interview. A good friend of hers go in to our small school system straight out of college but she was friends with two of teachers at the school. That's just how things work around here.
Besides getting an out of state license, does anyone think adding a highly qualified endorsement would also be beneficial? Since she has a reading endorsement, almost a reading/literacy master, I though adding highly qualified in ELA at least couldn't hurt.
Thanks for the input. While my daughter has been living at home rent free, she still has student loans and other expenses (including some serious health concerns that have plagued her since she was very young.) It's hard to get ahead when subbing a few times a week and working in retail.
But the more I read these posts, it seems that relocating is going to have to be a serious option if she wants to teach. With 200-400 applicants for every position, I doubt if she will even get an interview. A good friend of hers go in to our small school system straight out of college but she was friends with two of teachers at the school. That's just how things work around here.
Besides getting an out of state license, does anyone think adding a highly qualified endorsement would also be beneficial? Since she has a reading endorsement, almost a reading/literacy master, I though adding highly qualified in ELA at least couldn't hurt.
What does "highly qualified" mean? For ESSA purposes it means that teachers are certified and not provisional.
I would caution her about becoming over qualified (having said that, her dual SPED and Reading makes her more desirable). The more degrees she has the more expensive she becomes which is a bad place to be as an applicant for her first job.
In industry/business the more qualifications you have the more valuable you will be to the company. In education it just makes you more expensive.
All things being equal, school systems will hire the cheapest applicant they can get away with.
She may have to be careful with the out of state licensing. Since many states base their granting of certificates on Praxis scores it turns out that the Praxis scores to be certificated in each state are different.
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