PWC expects to hire 500-600 new teachers for 2012-13 school year

The September opening of the new Ronald Wilson Reagan Middle School in Haymarket and normal anticipated job turnover in the transient Prince William County area should lead to the hiring of between 500 and 600 new teachers or more for 2012-13, according to Darlene Faltz, supervisor of recruitment and specialty programs for the school division.

For the current 2011-12 school year…”by the end of August we had hired 603,” Faltz said, “but after school opened we continued to hire for a total of more than 750.”

The additional hires were necessitated by the Sept. 30 enrollment figures submitted by each school principal, Faltz explained. “The school allocations are adjusted based on student enrollment,” Faltz said, noting that Prince William County and other jurisdictions are required to maintain student/teacher ratios at state-mandated levels.

More than 56,000 people applied for those 750 positions, she said.

“We are the second largest school division in Virginia and a transient area. Retirement, the opening of new schools and student growth all affect the need to hire new teachers, she said. Three new schools, Patriot High School, T. Clay Wood Elementary and Piney Branch Elementary, all in western Prince William, opened in September 2011.

Prince William County, she said, is the only school system in Northern Virginia that has not been forced to lay off personnel during recent difficult economic times.
“We were able to prevent that from happening in Prince William by not filling vacant positions,” she said.

Recruiting for 2012-13 will focus on five critical need areas: math, ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages), science, special education and international languages, according to Faltz
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“We hired over 60 ESOL teachers this summer, Faltz said, 49 in 2009 and 58 in 2011 and the need is increasing”.