Part Time Teaching Licenses: Delaware

Expanding the Pool of Teachers Policy

Goal

The state should offer a license with minimal requirements that allows content experts to teach part time.

Does not meet goal
Suggested Citation:
National Council on Teacher Quality. (2011). Part Time Teaching Licenses: Delaware results. State Teacher Policy Database. [Data set].
Retrieved from: https://www.nctq.org/yearbook/state/DE-Part-Time-Teaching-Licenses-7

Analysis of Delaware's policies

Delaware does not offer a license with minimal requirements that would allow content experts to teach part time.

Recommendations for Delaware

Offer a license that allows content experts to serve as part-time instructors.
Delaware should permit individuals with deep subject-area knowledge to teach a limited number of courses without fulfilling a complete set of certification requirements. The state should verify content knowledge through a rigorous test and conduct background checks as appropriate, while waiving all other licensure requirements. Such a license would increase districts' flexibility to staff certain subjects, including many STEM areas, that are frequently hard to staff or may not have high enough enrollment to necessitate a full-time position.

State response to our analysis

Delaware recognized the factual accuracy of this analysis. The state contended, however, that given the current supply of highly-qualified and better-prepared teachers, the state sees no reason to waive basic licensure requirements. The state asserted that traditional or alternate route preparation is preferable to what NCTQ proposes in this goal.

Last word

A part-time license such as this can be helpful in allowing districts to fill shortage areas, such as physics, with content experts who may not be interested in teaching full time and thus are unlikely to be willing to complete a preparation program, even through an alternate route. 

Research rationale

The origin of this goal is the effort to find creative solutions to the STEM crisis. While teaching waivers are not typically used this way, teaching waivers could be used to allow competent professionals from outside of education to be hired as part-time instructors to teach courses such as Advanced Placement chemistry or calculus as long as the instructor demonstrates content knowledge on a rigorous test. See NCTQ, "Tackling the STEM Crisis" at: http://www.nctq.org/p/docs/nctq_nmsi_stem_initiative.pdf

For the importance of teachers' general academic ability, see R. Ferguson, "Paying for Public Education: New Evidence on How and Why Money Matters," Harvard Journal on Legislation 28 (1991), 465-498.

For more on math and science content knowledge, see D. Monk and J.R. King, "Subject Area Preparation of Secondary Mathematics and Science Teachers and Student Achievement," Economics of Education Review 12, no. 2 (1994), 125-145; R. Murnane, "Understanding the Sources of Teaching Competence: Choices, Skills, and the Limits of Training," Teachers College Record 84, no. 3 (1983)