Crisis in the Classroom: Dealing with teacher absenteeism in West Virginia

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WCHS) — It doesn't matter if you have the greatest teaching plan in history if you don't consistently have teachers in class to share it.

Eyewitness News obtained information from the West Virginia Department of Education which shows parts of the state where instructors were absent for a third or more of their 200-day contracts.

For the 2022-23 school year, records show about 52% of Clay County teachers were absent 21 days or more. That's 57 out of the district's 110 teachers.

Phil Dobbins is in his first year as the superintendent of Clay County Schools.

"When you look at student achievement, which is our number one priority, having consistent teachers in our classroom are paramount to consistent instruction," Dobbins said. "We stress that if at all possible, that we need to have teachers along with service personnel that are in our buildings. We track that monthly and we've seen an improvement in our numbers. Currently we've seen and this is overall, that we have approximately 6% of our service and professional staff that have missed 20 days plus."

The next four highest counties are Mason with 37%, Fayette with 35%, Gilmer with nearly 31% and Pleasants with 29%.

We asked Mason County Schools Superintendent Tim Hardesty what he's seeing this year with the attendance of teachers and staff members.

"I'm going to tell you I think that is one piece of the puzzle," Hardesty said. "I think the student and employee attendance is crucial. However, I don't think it tells the entire story. I think the quality of the instruction that takes place on the days that both are here is important to have in place. I think the more attendance you can have by students and staff and the quality instruction in the classroom, that's what is going to translate into achievement for our students."

None of these absences take into account workers' compensation, leave bank donations, the Family Medical Leave Act, maternity or paternity, military or jury duty.

West Virginia State Superintendent of Schools Michele Blatt weighed in on the issue from a statewide point of view.

"I think we are seeing decreases, once the light has been shone on it, and we've shone the impact that it makes student achievement and the impact of not having teachers in the classroom," Blatt explained. "Where we have a shortage of teachers it's hard to get substitutes. We know anytime that the actual teacher is not in front of the students then they're not getting the full quality of lessons they should receive."

Tier two teachers, which are those who were hired for the 2015-16 school year and beyond, get 200-day contracts. Teachers are allowed 10 days off and five sick days. Anything more than that and not in a covered category is considered an unexcused absence.

Administrators say many teachers call off and ask to be charged a dock day which means they aren't paid for the day off. However, dock days are not included in teachers' contracts nor are they mentioned in state law.

"We're currently looking at policies, or different policies that we can put into place with our, with the board of education that would eliminate those days," Dobbins said. "Currently we don't have a policy that addresses that. However, again there's nothing in code either that would allow that. But what happens in these smaller counties, you know we're limited on the number of educators we have. We're limited on certified educators. We're limited on service personnel. That would include custodians, cooks, teacher aides and bus drivers. You're put in a difficult situation if you eliminate a person's job. Do you have a certified person to fill that place?"

A reason being cited for high teacher absenteeism is a 2015 change which did away with banking leave time. Anyone hired after 2015 either uses off and sick days or loses them. If an instructor was hired prior to the 2015 school year days can be saved and used to enhance retirement benefits or extend insurance coverage.

The state education department asked lawmakers to find a way to make tier two days off more valuable but lawmakers took no final action and a bill died in committee.

"Our young teachers, as you said, tier two, they have no way to benefit from not using their days," Blatt added. "Basically they're working for free 15 days if they don't take those days is how they see it. Many of them are devoted and they continue to push through and don't take those days, but when you have the mindset, 'I'm not getting paid for those 15 days if I don't use them.' Then we start to see the absences that we're seeing now. When you think about if we could get the impact that the tier one teachers have on being able to use their days for all of our teachers, I think we would automatically see a decrease in the amount of days people take because they would see the benefit of saving them year to year."

There are some counties where vast majority of teachers actually show up to work. Randolph County leads the way with just one instructor taking 21 or more days off, translating to 0.4 %.

Doddridge County clocks in at 2% while Preston, Hardy, Upshur and Brooke counties all around 5%.