New teachers get three more years to make the grade

Thursday, July 3, 2003 | 11:29 a.m.

New teachers in Nevada will get an extra three years to meet testing requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act, a move that could allow the Clark County School District to immediately hire more than 200 people who are finishing their practice teaching.

The Clark County School District has been cleared to hire new teachers even if they haven't yet passed the Praxis II exam, said Lina Gutierrez, executive director of licensed personnel. The federal act had required all teachers meet new standards of accreditation by July 1. Teachers already employed by school districts have until July 2006 to meet the standards.

Keith Rheault, deputy superintendent of instruction for the Nevada Department of Education, said the change came after a closer reading of the No Child Left Behind Act raised questions about the timeline for implementing the new requirements. There were also questions about some of the federal definitions for a "new" teacher, Rheault said.

The federal education officials sent a letter last week saying the state could give more time to new teachers than was previously believed allowable under the law, Rheault said.

State educators plan to push to make passing the Praxis II a requirement for graduation from the student teacher programs at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and the University of Reno, Rheault said. There are currently more than 200 students completing their practice teaching requirements in Clark County schools who have not yet passed the Praxis exam.

"Down the road they'll be better prepared," Rheault said.

Because of the legislative deadlock, the Clark County School District was forced to suspend hiring new teachers with about 1,000 vacant positions for the start of the 2003-04 academic year Aug. 25, Gutierrez said. More than 400 literacy and technology specialists, along with teachers in the gifted and talented program, were reassigned to regular classrooms.

While the federal exemption is good news, it won't help until the district is able to resume making job offers, Gutierrez said.

"Nothing is going to help with hiring until the whole mess with the Legislature is solved," Gutierrez said. "But at least now I can look at local student teachers as part of the candidate pool. Before I was panicking because after Monday we couldn't even consider them."

The school district needs every job candidate it can scrape up, Gutierrez said. Even with the reassignments of the specialists, the district still has more than 700 open positions to fill, Gutierrez said.

In addition to providing more leeway for new teachers, the federal exemption also allows more time for teachers at Title I schools to meet new requirements. At-risk campuses with many low-income students may receive extra federal money and are designated as Title I schools.

The new rules for teachers at Title I schools took effect last year, with teachers required to meet "highly qualified" standards. The federal exemption will allow teachers to transfer from a regular campus to a Title I school in the same district and still have until July 2006 to meet the new standards, Rheault said.