Where Have All the Teachers Gone?

Yes, we have a crisis on our hands. Torah Umesorah’s online job board currently has 90 teacher and administrator positions open for the 2021-2022 school year. Administrators around the country speak about the challenge of finding quality candidates to fill limudei kodesh positions, particularly in out-of-town communities — and Monsey, Far Rockaway, and 50 minutes out of Lakewood also count. Candidates interested in teaching younger boys’ elementary grades are scarce, and retaining high school moros — and replacing those who leave with qualified and experienced candidates — has hit crisis mode in many girls’ schools. In the field of kiruv, NCSY, among other outreach organizations, has openings coast to coast for full-time, front-line kiruv work. One major yeshivah in North America, which used to be known as a feeder into community kollels and whose graduates are known to have filled spots in all the major national klal-work organizations, is no longer “sending out” into community kollels or kiruv work. Those going into klei kodesh want pulpit rabbi positions; otherwise, those who leave full-time learning are typically going into business. When avreichim leave the beis medresh these days, it’s Amazon versus chinuch, and Amazon is winning.

What’s going on? Is it the salaries? The rising standard of frum living? The challenging nature of klei kodesh positions?

To illustrate the problem, one director of a kiruv organization shared with me that he recently interviewed two young men from a prominent American yeshivah. Both men told him that they couldn’t recommend any others for outreach positions because they themselves are anomalies. Both have unique backgrounds that led them to be interested in a kiruv position, but they know they are black sheep, pursuing a different path than the generally accepted goals within the system. He was left wondering if outreach is even a value anymore.

Yet on the other hand, one cannot criticize a young man’s desire to support his family and ease the burden off his wife. If an Amazon business or a real estate job is going to allow him to bring in a solid salary that meets the ever-increasing needs of a growing family, and allows him ample time to learn too, then taking care of one’s own may drown out any propensity or personal calling for teaching.