Editorial: Creating staying power

Sunday, Aug. 19, 2007 | 1:14 a.m.

A large number of the Clark County School District's 2,000 new teachers are first-timers who have moved here from other states. But luring them to Las Vegas is only one challenge in addressing the region's ongoing teacher shortage.

A story by the Las Vegas Sun on Thursday points out that if the trend continues, roughly half of this year's new hires will leave within five years, after gaining enough experience to win teaching positions in their hometowns.

One new teacher told Sun reporter Emily Richmond that she came to Clark County this year because she didn't have enough experience to land one of the few open teaching positions in her home state of New Jersey. She intends to leave after working here three to five years.

As if that isn't challenge enough, the School District still was short 445 classroom teachers and 200 counselors as of last week. Retaining teachers from year to year is important, as continued growth means that there will always be more openings than there are teachers to fill them.

To their credit, School District officials don't let the shortfall push them into hiring just anyone to teach the region's children. The district has a pool of roughly 2,000 elementary school teaching applicants and more than 550 applicants for middle and high school positions, the Sun reports. But it is important to match teachers with the right job, which also helps with retention.

Certainly, it is difficult to persuade people that they can live in Clark County while earning only a first-year teacher's salary of about $33,000 a year. But other factors about life in Southern Nevada could also play into teachers' decisions to stay or go.

The traffic congestion, the bawdy image revolving around the city's tourism industry and the perceived lack of cultural pursuits that frustrates some residents can turn off prospective teachers as well. And when it comes to retaining good teachers, maybe the School District isn't the only entity that should be involved in making sure that Southern Nevada remains an attractive and rewarding place to live.