According to the latest jobs from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, K-12 schools lost 50,000 workers from June to July. The numbers for May were also revised down by another 47,000.

These are seasonally adjusted numbers. Each year, public schools 鈥渓ose鈥� about 1 million employees who come off the payrolls in the summer months, only to add those workers back in the fall. But the latest numbers suggest that the 2026 decline is a bit larger than normal.

Because of these summer patterns, I like to look at the non-seasonally adjusted numbers. The graph below shows that trend over the last few years. Each line represents one calendar year. The 2020 line is in red. You can see the big drop-off in March when schools shut down for COVID. They no longer needed as many bus drivers and lunch staff, etc. But each year since then payrolls have grown (follow the gray lines upwards).

Now look at the 2026 line, in green. It was trending slightly above 2025 in the spring, but it now sits below the 2025 line. As of July, with no seasonal adjustment, public schools employed about 29,000 fewer workers than they did at this time last year.

Now, these are preliminary figures subject to revisions. But they represent the first year-over-year declines that we鈥檝e seen since the pandemic.

The decline so far is not large in percentage terms. We鈥檙e talking about a decline of 0.4%, and this represents total workers, not full-time equivalents. School districts typically adjust around the margins first, reducing part-time positions or cutting hours before eliminating full-time jobs. These also don鈥檛 represent increases in layoffs鈥攖hose remain stable. Instead, this is mostly about a slowdown in hiring.

This shouldn鈥檛 be entirely surprising. School districts have spent the last two years warning about the end of federal pandemic aid and slower state revenue growth. For a while, many districts have been able to avoid workforce reductions. These latest employment numbers suggest that budget pressures may finally be showing up in the national data.

The other education sectors did not have as big of a change. As I鈥檝e written , the number of state education employees (public higher education) peaked more than a year ago. As a sector, it is down about 25,000 employees from a year ago, a decline of 1.1%.

The private childcare sector is down about 5,000 workers from a year ago, a decline of 0.4%.

Whether the latest numbers mark the beginning of a sustained decline or just a temporary pause will become clearer over time. But the years of uninterrupted staffing growth may be ending.

Some districts are offering thousands in signing bonuses, others adapt to four-day work weeks and many are easing the way for college students or other would-be teaching candidates to get quickly certified.

In 2018, the National Bureau of Labor Statistics would leave the profession annually through 2026 鈥� a number that did not take into account the pandemic鈥檚 effects on teacher retention and retirement. A 2020 revealed that almost a third nationwide would likely retire early or leave the profession because of the pandemic. Yet the bureau鈥檚 recent job data shows that actual teacher turnover levels are similar 鈥� and in some cases lower 鈥斕齮han pre-pandemic levels. The estimated outcomes from alarming polls, suggesting that teachers everywhere would imminently leave the profession, have not necessarily come to fruition.

Retirement and attrition do vary greatly by county or state 鈥� saw about 200 more teachers leave by the end August 2020 than in 2019 or 2018, while Minnesota experienced the opposite effect 鈥� and there鈥檚 still much to be understood about the full scope of how the pandemic has affected the teaching force. At the same time, we do know that fewer adults are heading into .

The lengths that some school and state leaders are going to to fill current vacancies, especially for special education and substitute teachers, does demonstrate that districts are seeing urgent staffing needs and are getting creative to meet them.

Accelerated licensure programs and alternatives for state teaching exams are popping up across the country to urgently meet students鈥� needs. Houston, for instance, had over 400 teacher openings as of mid-August; some may be filled by .

Though places like metro aren鈥檛 experiencing the same levels of staff scarcity, they are still offering a $5,000 sign-on incentive for special education teachers. Greater Atlanta鈥檚 DeKalb County Schools are also recruiting for full-time positions.

Out West, a aims to transform the educator pipeline by recruiting high school students into teacher programs, former military personnel and adjunct professors. Nevada鈥檚 Carson City Schools will public employees to fill special education vacancies, and others in California are adopting the strategy of recruiting teachers where they鈥檝e grown up, incentivizing staying in-state for higher education or pursuing teaching residencies in their home districts.

One framed staffing challenges as a human capital problem, not a financial one. To aid schools鈥� pandemic recovery, millions in unprecedented federal relief funds are on their way to states. Only a handful included teacher recruitment or retention strategies in their budget proposals; nationwide, priorities for the relief funds are expanding academic tutoring and mental health care.

And critical shortages go beyond the classroom 鈥� are , after many have retired or decided to not risk COVID-19 exposure. Up to 250 National Guard service members will drive students to school in Massachusetts, and school leaders in are encouraging their governor to consider the same. Efforts to engage the National Guard in New York were rejected by Gov. Kathy Hochul; a spokesperson for her team said school transportation was

In , where drivers are leaving en masse after the district mandated staff vaccines, some families of students with disabilities were given two days to find alternative transportation for the first day of school.

Students and families across the country are feeling the impacts of missing critical staff as the 2021-22 school year and quarantines get underway.

We鈥檝e compiled some of the special education and substitute teacher recruitment efforts currently in effect:

Special Education Teacher Recruitment

reported teacher shortages in special education in the 2020-21 school year.

鈥淲e beg, borrow and steal wherever we can to find some good quality special education teachers for our district,鈥� Jose Delfin. The schools chief spoke during a school board meeting where the district designated the labor shortage as critical, enabling the hiring of retired public employees.

And while advocates have sounded the alarm on a declining special education force for , states like have just established recruitment and retention task forces.

Click here if you cannot access the interactive version of this map.

Substitute Teacher Recruitment

Schools across the country employ between 500,000 and 600,000 subs annually, according to the National Bureau of Labor Statistics. School administrators in say substitute applications have trickled to a stop. For smaller districts in California with teachers heading into COVID-19 quarantines, declining substitute teacher pools could force school .

In Idaho, Gov. Brad Little to fill shortages, 鈥淚 urge Idahoans in a position to serve as a substitute teacher or other classroom support staff to contact your school district and get signed up. Idaho students and our communities need you.鈥�

Click here if you cannot access the interactive version of this map.