Parents say teacher shortage impacts education in Ambridge Area School District
AMBRIDGE, Pa. (KDKA) — Parents are mad in the Ambridge Area School District.
They said the teacher shortage continues to impact the education of students and the district is not doing enough. The new school year is not even a week old, but parents in Ambridge are already over it.
"My child has been in school for five days. He's had three different substitute teachers for his English class. What's learning? He's been on his phone," mother Laura McClellan said.
McClellan said her three high school students are not getting an education. She and multiple parents said the lack of teachers has been an issue for years. They claim pay and student behavior have driven teachers away.
Several parents have complained this year about a lack of teachers in the high school English department. The superintendent said the district has a certified teacher in one position and the district is onboarding a chosen candidate for an open position.
"There's no end result here. There's no fixable solution here," McClellan said.
Emails went out last year telling parents about how a sub had to teach some classes so many days in a row before the district made a hire. For parents like Christina Voloch, it's all more of the same.
"What help is that? I could do the same thing at home and they could do a cyber," said Voloch, who has two kids in the district and a third who graduated last year.
Her daughter graduated last year and said she didn't learn anything in her college prep class. It was the same during her freshman-year math class.
"They just ho-hummed it. They didn't seem concerned with our children's future," Voloch said.
McClellan feels it may be time to move on as well. She said after three of her children finish high school, she has reservations about keeping her younger children in the district.
"This isn't a privilege to get an education. We deserve that. We pay for that," McClellan said.
KDKA-TV reached out to the school board about this matter but has not heard back.