Pennsylvania’s student teacher stipend program does not receive enough funding to cover the cost, leaving thousands of would-be teachers shut out of what was supposed to be a lifeline to guide more educators into the classroom.

Act 33 of 2023 created $10,000 stipends for student teachers, ending the long-standing requirement that would-be teachers complete their 12-week in-class assignments without compensation. But because the state budget has not provided enough to fully fund the stipend program, in the first two school years in which stipends have been available about 54% of student teachers received stipends.

The shortfall meant that about 3,600 would-be teachers applied for stipends but did not get them.

That creates stark inequities even within the same school buildings, Sen. Frank Farry, R-Bucks, said at a press conference Monday morning.

“You could literally be in a school building, and a student teacher in one classroom has a stipend and a student teacher across the hall does not,” Farry said. That’s not only unfair but it makes it more challenging for state and local officials to recruit enough would-be teachers to replace those who are leaving the field.

The shortage means school districts have increasingly leaned on emergency permits to hire teachers when they cannot find job candidates with the appropriate teaching certificate.

In the 2023-24 school year, there were more than 28,000 teachers working on emergency permits, according to Department of Education data. That’s triple the number of teachers working with emergency permits a decade earlier.

The state has not released updated data for the 2024-25 school year yet.

As of the 2023-2024 school year, Pennsylvania’s teacher workforce stood at 123,190, with the largest shortages in grades 4-8, special education, secondary math, secondary science, and career and technical education.

Schools in almost every county in the state report at least moderate teacher shortages, and schools in more than 60% of the state’s counties report facing severe shortages of candidates for teaching jobs, according to Teach Plus Pennsylvania.

Gov. Josh Shapiro’s budget proposal calls for boosting the program’s funding by $5 million, a 16.6% increase over the $30 million allocated for the stipends in 2025-26.

That will not be enough to fully close the shortfall but it will make progress, said Sen. Vincent Hughes, D-Philadelphia.

“Every year, we increase the funding,” he said. “We just need to keep fighting for it.”

Jeff Ney, vice president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association, the state’s largest teacher union, said that inflation has made it even harder for college students interested in becoming teachers.

“Life is expensive, is what really is at the heart of the issue here today. Forr decades, education majors were expected to quit their evening and weekend jobs to go without income during their full time student teaching,” Ney said, noting that he went through that experience himself. “But in today’s economy, that is next to impossible for college students.”

It’s also unfair to have unpaid student teachers when students in other fields can land paid internships, he said.

“From 12 to 15 weeks, you’re working full time preparing lessons, teaching students, grading papers, and reflecting on the experiences from your mentor teacher,” he said. “Nothing prepares you to be a teacher better than standing in front of a class of rowdy middle schools, or shy

kindergartners, or eager high school students.”