That teachers can be remote too isn’t frequently noted, but of course, that happened frequently during the pandemic when both students and teachers were connecting from home; just not the same home.
As a model for the physical space being much less important, remote teaching and learning still needs a great deal of development. Visions of how the relationship with physical space might best be structured are various, and still early days.
One of the aspects of learning that has been found important is having a mentor/ emotional support person elevating the students emotional confidence for taking on learning risks. We don’t seem to have enough of those support people around for each student that could really use one.
Now, there’s AI that can become a student’s “adult mentor/ support” individually designed to work best for that particular student. We are on the road to find out how valuable AI can be in dealing with physical remoteness and in providing a version of that “human touch” much discussed as an essential part of the learning environment.
One thing we can say, is that there will be no AI shortage of pseudo teachers and mentors, while the same cannot be said for traditional human in local parentis teachers.
Schools around the country have struggled to find enough teachers. And as the pandemic wanes, the shortages have only gotten worse.
Quantifying the precise nature of the teacher shortage is difficult, as EdSurge has reported. But the vacancies are in the tens of thousands across the country. In rural areas, the problem is acutely felt.
That has led some rural schools to take an unusual staffing approach — hiring teachers who live thousands of miles away to teach students remotely.
The approach is happening through partnerships with companies like Elevate K-12, a Chicago-based provider of remote teachers. The company has inked deals to provide virtual teachers around the country — such as one it recently signed to source chemistry and physics teachers for Key West High School in Florida, worth between $90,000 and $274,000. Other companies are involved as well. Proximity Learning, based in Texas, recruits teachers from overseas for the same purpose.
Some of these rural schools report that they have no choice, with swollen housing prices making teacher hires more difficult.
While these remote teachers are credentialed, there are those who question whether long-distance instruction can match the quality of the in-person kind. Another concern is that these arrangements keep teachers from becoming part of the communities they teach in.
It’s not the only unusual way schools are looking to fill vacancies, as many states have been speeding up credentialing processes.