Though it’s expected that teacher turnover will decrease over the next few years, it’s estimated that there were at least 49,000 vacant teaching positions and 400,000 underqualified educators instructing in classrooms nationwide during the 2024-25 school year, according to a project led by researchers from the University of Missouri and the University of Pittsburgh.
Texas has one of the highest teacher underqualification rates in the country, according to the University of Missouri-University of Pittsburgh research project.
Between the 2019-20 and 2024-25 school years, the total number of uncertified teachers in Texas jumped from 12,900 to 42,100, the Texas Education Agency found. That means 12% of the state’s total teachers were uncertified by 2024-25 compared to 3.8% before the pandemic.