July 12, 2018, Philly.com: The teacher supply is plummeting. Pa. will spend $2M to stem the tide http://www.philly.com/philly/education/teacher-supply-plummeting-pa-governor-wolf-grants-2m-recruitment-retention-20180712.html Pennsylvania used to license more than 14,000 new teachers annually. Now, it issues certificates to fewer than 5,000. The state is aiming to do something about that.... The number of education majors in Pennsylvania colleges and universities has dropped 55 percent since 1996, officials said. And the number of new teaching certificates issued in the state sunk 71 percent between 2009-10 and 2016-17, to just 4,412 from 14,247…. The situation is not limited to this area. There is a nationwide shortage of teachers — most acute in special education, science and math. The supply of new teachers is declining, according to recent research, as the demand for educators is swelling. Teacher turnover is a problem as well. Up to 50 percent of new teachers leave the profession in the first five years; experts estimate the teacher attrition rate is about 8 percent annually, with higher rates in urban districts….
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Childhood Lost
Children today are noticeably different from previous generations, and the proof is in the news coverage we see every day. This site shows you what’s happening in schools around the world. Children are increasingly disabled and chronically ill, and the education system has to accommodate them. Things we've long associated with autism, like sensory issues, repetitive behaviors, anxiety and lack of social skills, are now problems affecting mainstream students. Blame is predictably placed on bad parenting (otherwise known as trauma from home).
Addressing mental health needs is as important as academics for modern educators. This is an unrecognized disaster. The stories here are about children who can’t learn or behave like children have always been expected to. What childhood has become is a chilling portent for the future of mankind.
Anne Dachel, Media editor, Age of Autism
http://www.ageofautism.com/media/
(John Dachel, Tech. assist.)
What will happen in another 4 years? How can we go on like this? This is a national (and international) problem of monumental proportions. We have an entire new class of children who cannot be accommodated by the system: many are manifestly neurologically impaired. Meanwhile, the government and the medical profession sleep on regardless.
John Stone,
UK media editor, Age of Autism
The generation of American children born after 1990 are arguably the sickest generation in the history of our country.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
It seemed to me that with rising autism prevalence, you’d also see rising autism costs to society, and it turns out, the costs are catastrophic.
They calculated that in 2015 autism cost the United States $268 billion and they projected that if autism continues at its current rate, we’re looking at one trillion dollars a year in autism costs by 2025, so within five years.
Toby Rogers, PhD, Political economist
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