Episode 5: Hiring Educators in 2023

Hiring in schools used to feel straightforward. Now it’s a sprint, a strategy game, and a year-round relationship sport. We unpack why the pipeline shrank, where strong candidates still come from, and how leaders can move faster without lowering the bar. From hard-to-staff roles like math, science, and SPED to the subtle art of culture fit, we share what’s working on the ground and how to scale it.

We walk through grow-your-own pathways that start in high school, including education academies, meaningful practicum experiences, and paid student teaching that turns your building into a talent magnet. You’ll hear how to pre-brief references, streamline interviews, and make confident same-day offers. We also dig into branding: the social footprint that shows candidates who you are, why your teachers stay, and how your systems support growth. Instagram, TikTok, and a clear careers page aren’t fluff—they’re your recruiting storefront.

Widening the net is essential, so we break down practical ways to partner with out-of-state universities, consider international J‑1 educators, and leverage transition-to-teaching programs that bring skilled professionals into the classroom. That path demands intentional mentorship, so we map the training essentials—classroom management, lesson design, and feedback—that build competence and retention. When roles remain open, we get creative: shared staffing across districts, online courses, and hybrid schedules that protect access without sacrificing quality. Along the way, we stay human: don’t take departures personally, hire for culture add, and trust your team’s read.

If you’re a principal, HR lead, or department chair staring at thin applicant pools, this conversation gives you a clear playbook and a dose of optimism. Subscribe for more practical leadership episodes, share this with a colleague who’s hiring, and leave a review with the tactic you’re trying next.

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Transcript

Principal JL: 0:59

Episode 5 Hiring and Education in 2023. Hello everybody. I am back for another episode. This is Principal JL. Today we're going to talk about hiring in education. I mean, it's stressful out there. There's a lot of teachers that are either moving jobs or you got a lot of openings and you're trying to fill them. So basically, this episode is about what is it like out there? What is it really like to be hiring education in the year 2023? The first question I have to ask is where are all the educators? Well, I kind of was looking around trying to figure out this question that I had in my mind, like because it feels like, man, no one's applying for jobs. There's hardly anybody out there. But after discussing with several colleges, students seem to have maybe lost some interest in education. It's not as attractive as it used to be. So these are some reasonings that I figured out that maybe why we don't have as many educators out in the field. Now, colleges are trying to recruit students into education, but struggle in the recruiting process because they get pulled away to do other things. So let's say like a math teacher, you're in college, you're doing math, and you can actually just go be an engineer with the same type of math classes you're taking to college to become a math teacher, and people will go, Wow, I could make more money doing this than doing that. So that kind of draws them away. So there's some you know reasonings why people are not going into the education field. Now, with that said, that's where we're at in education. Over the past decade or so, less and less people have been going to college for education. That's why there's been less people coming out of college in education. So retaining your people can become a lot more important. And colleges just aren't graduating teachers like they used to. It used to be, man, you know, you'd graduate college and you'd have to work to get a job. But now it seems like everybody, you know, you know, if you become an educator, you can have probably about a job anywhere you want, just because there's not as many, especially in certain fields. So, like if you're looking at math teachers, science teachers, you know, some English teachers, FCS teachers, SPED teachers, I mean, these teachers are at a premium. So trying to find good teachers sometimes is difficult, but they are out there. We just have to maybe rethink how we go about hiring. Now, school districts have to look at growing their own workforce. So, some things that you know are on my mind or things I've been thinking about, or things I've seen other schools do, as they're starting to expose high school students to the education field, you know, as an example of trying to get more people recruited into that field. So they would do things like they'd create courses for students to explore education as a career, and they give them some field experiences that are meaningful. Some schools, high schools are creating education academies or pathways, giving them opportunities and they're encouraging students to go to college to become educators. So there's a lot of schools that are doing that. A lot of other schools are doing to grow their own workforces, they're trying to bring as many student teachers in as possible. Some school districts have even gone to pay in student teachers so they can come gain a competitive advantage. You can create your own candidate pool when you have student teachers in your building. You're gonna get to know them, you're gonna have an insight track to bring them on board. So if you get a quality one, you have an opening, boom, there you go. You got somebody that you can look to hire right away. You know, get to know them, interview them. If they fit, boom, go ahead and get them hired. You don't need to wait around. This is what you got to do when you are bringing in these student teachers and you're you are having these high school kids starting to, you know, look and explore at the field of education. What you're doing is you're starting to build a network. And then what you need to do is start building networks within the college because that's going to become very key because you want to gain these student teachers from these colleges, and creating that network is huge and important. Schools must get creative with hiring. You cannot afford to be passive right now. Like it used to be like, hey, I can sit here, I can collect a bunch of applicants, I can go over and pick out the best ones I see. Well, that's not necessarily the case. I kind of fell into that a little bit this year where I was trying to trying to bring, you know, trying to wait, trying to get some more people in, but I ended up losing good quality cannons because I waited too long. So you have to get aggressive. Don't wait for Canon pool to swell. If you have a good cannon, get them in an interview quickly. So what I have done or what I've been doing is I've been doing my reference checks prior to interviewing. This allows you to basically identify the people that you want that would be a good fit, but you do that background check right away. And if they're a good fit, then that's gonna help you make a good decision. So if I'm doing a background check on somebody and I go, yep, they're gonna be a good candidate, I bring them in for an interview, like you know, and then if they're a good fit, I pull the trigger. Like I'm not waiting a day or so to hire them. I might give somebody an offer right away before they walk out the door because hey, it's competitive out there. You are competing against all the school districts around you. It sucks, but that's where we're at. Another thing I want you to think about is trust your hiring team. If we have a team of people hiring, trust them, use them. If they say go for it, go for it. Don't overthink it. Now, with that said, not everybody's hireable. It's important to do those background checks prior to bringing them in for an interview. But man, sometimes there's some jobs it's just hard to bring, you know, to do that right away. So sometimes you want to set up that interview, do your background checks. If they're a good fit, make sure you pull that trigger. If you have only a few or one candidate, move quickly. Like, don't sit there and think you're gonna get more candidates because you know, those people are not just applying for your job, they're probably applying for other jobs. So you want to try to move quickly to get those people hired as quickly as possible. Now, some things you can do to help create more candidates and a better pool is you got to brand your school. So you need to advertise. Like a lot of schools I've seen advertise used in the radio, billboards, people still, as a matter of fact, use the newspaper, internet platforms. A lot of school districts have their online platform that they put out for hiring people. So they're like I say Nebraska, there's a Nebraska Teach platform. A lot of school districts have their own electronic platform that they use to do that advertising, but this is where social media comes in to play. If you have a social media present with your school and you want to make sure it's a positive one, this basically is key because you want to present to these candidates the message, what are you about? Because this will be helpful to bring them in and determine if they want to apply for your district. I always looked at the social media footprint of schools before I applied because I want to see what they are about, because not every school is a perfect fit for every. And remember, you are competing against other schools, so you have to get your digital footprint or social media footprint out there, and you have to show that positive messaging so you can bring good quality candidates into your pool. So things you can do. You can use a Facebook page, a Twitter page. Now, Instagram pages, that's where you're gonna get some of those younger ones. They do not really, the younger ones don't use a lot of Twitter, they don't use a lot of Facebook, but they do use Instagram, they are on TikTok. I mean, just saying, think about different ways to get your message out on media platforms so you can engage some of those younger audiences. So the goal is to stay on top of the social media trends and use them to your advantage in order to recruit possible candidates. Now, the other thing you need to do is build relationships. Build relationships with colleges in your state. So if you got you know college in your state, build those relationships, but also think about building relationships at colleges around your state as well. You know, I don't, I'm not too far from the Kansas area as well as Nebraska. I mean, does it take long to get to Colorado or Iowa from where I'm at? So I'm looking at colleges in other states to see if I could try to pull somebody as a possible candidate. But you have to build those relationships. You also have to think about how do I expand my pool. Look to national to advertising when you have those social media platforms, that's the national advertising, right? Post your jobs on your media site, on your social media to show, hey, come work for this great school and why they're doing that, they can check out other things you can do. Look out-of-state candidates. A lot of school, a lot of states can compete with other states because they have better benefits. So if you can take somebody from another state because you can lure them in with your benefits, use that as a tool to your advantage. Now, some schools are also looking outside the United States for candidates. A lot of schools are using J1 visa candidates, and they are doing this to get people recruited from other countries. Now, a main country that I've seen over and over again is the Philippines. There's a lot of teachers from the Philippines that'll have a J1 visa. If you see an applicant, they are legit. You could check them out, figure out, you know, if they would fit you. And don't be afraid to bring those J1 visa candidates in. They are teachers, they just teach in another country. They have to jump through some hoops, but you know what? You can do it. Now, one thing that I have seen that's really expanded our pool, because our pool of candidates coming out of colleges has shrunk, a lot of colleges have started this transition program. So transition teachers, they're great, but they will require more training. If you you can find good teachers this way, and I think using these transition programs is essential to filling those jobs. Anyone with a college degree can be a transition teacher. You can have a college degree in business, you gotta have a college degree in physics or anything you can think of. They can take that college degree, put them in a transition program, get them a provisional so they can teach. Now, these teachers have to have a job, and so they take that information that they have. They would say, Okay, you would fit this endorsement. We will give you permission to teach this subject area at this level, you know, and you get a job, you're in the program, they're gonna teach you how to manage stuff, but at the same time, these teachers are do not have student teaching experience, so you're gonna have to, you know, be able to help them out. You're gonna have to take the time to train them on classroom management, you're gonna have to do, you know, teach them how to do lesson plans, you're gonna have to teach them some things, but it's gonna be worth it because you're gonna find good teachers this way. So, in a way, you're kind of growing your own in that way by using these transition teachers. Teachers are out there, you just gotta think differently on how you get them, right? Now, there's that traditional route where you go to college, you come in, you know, that is starting to fade a little bit. Now, you still can get a lot of good teachers through the colleges, there's just not as many of them as there used to be. That's why you have to think about things differently. You know, the biggest thing you gotta do is you gotta build a big network, cast a wide net. As Jordan Harbinger says, dig the well before you're thirsty. There are a lot of thirsty schools out there, and you need to make sure you're networking so you can try to find candidates to bring them in so you can hire them and fill your positions. Teachers in the transition program, I think in the future they're gonna be very vital. I think it's gonna be a very important, you know, resource for schools to be able to bring them in, you know. And we already talked about you just have to do things maybe a little differently. I guarantee you, these teachers that are coming in that are transitioning, they're willing to learn. They're real, they're motivated. Treat them well, support them, make sure you give them all the training you can. What I'm gonna say next is you gotta train, train, train your teachers, no matter who they are, you're looking at retention. So all faculty needs to be properly trained to build skills and confidence. Make sure when you do these trainings, they're valuable, they're necessary for the success of your teachers and for your school goals. If you don't train them properly, they're gonna do whatever they they think they need to do. But the thing is, is they may be wasting, you know, valuable classroom time because they're not quite understanding some things. You need to make sure you train them in a way that is fits your school and what your goals and mission are. Teachers do not like to waste time, don't waste their time with stuff that they are not gonna use. Give them the basic information, help them learn so they can be successful. Then once they get that down, then you can expand those trainings, you can expand those things that you need to do. The next thing you got to think about is bring in educators that will enhance your school cultures. Not every candidate will be best fit for your school. So you need to get very clear on what you're looking for in a candidate. You have to think about, you know, while you're interviewing people, how can I grow this candidate? What can I do to make them successful? Do they fit within the what our structure is and what we do? These are important things. That's why you have to trust your team of people when you're hiring these tea these candidates, understand that yes, this person's gonna fit us, let's get them. So that's very important. Lastly, what I don't want you to do is take things personally during this process. You're gonna have people tell you no, that's okay. You know, when you lose a teacher, it's okay. I mean, a lot of time most teachers leave, it's for a personal reason. It's nothing really against you or the school or anything like that. Maybe they just want to get closer to family, maybe they have a different opportunity that they would like. Don't think teachers that are leaving or you know, it's for you know any ill will or anything against you as a principal. Just know it's okay. Teachers will leave, they're gonna come and go. That's just the nature of the business. Most teachers leave because it's what's best for them and their family. So don't take that stuff personally when someone you know leaves your school. So when someone leaves, you have the opportunity to grow new teachers, and that is exciting. So that's what you got to think about when you think about hey, I have this opening, I have the opportunity to bring someone in that we can grow and make them the best teacher possible for our students. And who wouldn't want to do that? As a principal, that's what I'd want to do. I took all these openings we had, and we were excited about what who can we bring in that could fit us and we can help them become the best they can. Now, most principals are in this profession because they love to watch teachers grow and students grow. So embrace this process and have fun with it. You're gonna have your ups, you're gonna have downs. Like you're gonna have people that you're putting on an interview list, and then they're gonna call you and say, you know what, I took a job somewhere else. Man, that's happening all the time sometimes. But when you get that higher, it feels so good because you know you put the work in, you make sure you find someone that will fit, and that is the best feeling to have is when you get to onboard these people and you're building your team, you're getting a chance to build the team, you know, around the you know, the people that you have to make your school great. When you're looking at this, don't sweat things. You know, you may not be able to hire everybody you need. Right now, I have three positions open in my school, but I've hired, you know, 10 people already, you know, right around there, around, yeah, about eight or nine, ten. That's where I'm at. You know, I don't have the numbers in front of me. But nonetheless, I have three positions opening. I'm gonna have to think about being creative on what I do with that, you know. So you have the opportunity now to become very creative. You don't want to be stagnant as a leader, you want to start to be creative. So, teachers, when you're in a time of need, best quality about educators is that they are willing and they're great at stepping up in times of need. That is the reason why education is awesome. I see this day in and day out with my staff. When things go down and it's a mess, they are willing to step in and help. Now, that's where you got to make sure you treat them well. You got to make sure you take care of them because they're gonna step up for you. You need to step up for them as well. You may have to use online methods to fill your gaps. It may not be ideal, but it is a real solution. I know some school districts have talked about, well, we can't hire this type of teacher, so we might have to hook up with another school district and maybe do what share a teacher and do an online, you know, program. Or we have an online system that we can, hey, we don't have somebody in this, you know, that could teach this class, but we have an online version of it. Here you go. This is how we're gonna fill that gap. Don't be afraid of that. It it can be kids now are you know starting to think about you know, online schooling and traditional schooling, and how do you how do you accommodate the a lot of those different types of learning? Now, this is where you may rethink how you schedule your courses and your teachers and your master's schedule coming up. You know, you may have to be thinking about, okay, this is what a traditional setting looks like or a traditional schedule is. I may have to look at hybrid schedules where you have part traditional and part online, and then you can have like a whole online schedule for students to choose from. Because I think that's where education is going, you know, and because of these different, you know, challenges we're having, we might have to start relying on online resources to help fill those gaps. So don't be afraid of those things. If you have to use them, use them. You may have to use it for a year, and maybe you can find somebody in the next, you know, next time around, when you have these options, you may be able to relieve some stress from your teachers and students as well. The goal is to have students get an education, get in their education, it was going to look different from one student to the next. And it's okay to have these different avenues. There you have it. This is my take on hiring an education in 2023. The hiring season is coming to a close, but think about this hiring great teachers is a year-round search. When you find one, start courting them, start building that relationship. So if you have some student teachers coming in the fall, and man, you got someone that are, yep, this person is great. I think we might have some openings in this person's area for next year. You need to start building that relationship because when that time comes, you'll be able to hire them much easier because you've taken the time to build that relationship with them. So make sure you're you're looking for that teacher that you might need down the road. And the thing is, is build that network. Go out, you know, get to know people, you know, go to these different events um throughout the year to network outside of your area because you might have some a connection to somebody that might be able to help you out when it comes to hiring. That's going to be super important is the network, network, network. Thank you guys for listening. I appreciate all of you. Until next time, Principal JL out.