A comprehensive, data-laden report released by the Santa Cruz-based Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning earlier this month heralds an impending teacher shortage of crisis proportions in California. This assertion rests not so much on any measurable trends in the supply of teachers but principally on the major shortcomings of California's public-school teaching force: namely, the lack of "fully credentialed" (i.e. school of education graduates) teachers.

Stemming from California's famed class-size reduction initiative and the newer need to comply with No Child Left Behind standards, policymakers have taken several measures to fill California's classrooms with teachers, including beefing up alternate routes to certification. Never mind that the policymakers are seeing some success—such as the number of emergency credentialed teachers are down about 40% in the last three years—bolstered by another downward trend in the number of teachers California needs (4,000 last year). Doomsday is still on the horizon.

The real sticking point for the authors is the growing reliance of California schools on alternative certification teachers, the "Intern" teaching credential, that the authors conveniently group for their purposes with emergency credentialed teachers--even though interns do meet an academic standard and emergency teachers do not. They're all still "under-prepared." The authors theorize the declining enrollments in the state's ed schools is due to the surge in interns and NCLB's support of alternative certification routes. "By defining interns as 'highly qualified' under NCLB, California has legitimized intern programs and eliminated disincentives for teachers to participate in them.???