Hiring Policy
Emergency License(s) Availability: Louisiana allows teachers who have not met licensure requirements to teach on a Temporary Authority to Teach (TAT) certificate. This certificate may be issued for one year and is nonrenewable. Teachers must meet the requirements for a Practitioner license at the end of the year in order to continue teaching. The Practitioner license requires passage of a basic skills exam and content assessments where applicable.
The state also offers a Temporary Employment Permit (TEP), which allows individuals who have not passed required state tests to
teach if their aggregate score on all of their exams is equal to or
higher than the total required on all the tests.
Emergency License Validity Period:
Louisiana's TAT certificate is valid for one year and is nonrenewable. The TEP is valid for one year and may be renewed for up to three years if the candidate demonstrates that the test was retaken during the past year.
Ensure that all teachers pass required subject-matter licensing tests before they enter the classroom.
All students are entitled to teachers who know the subject matter they are teaching.
Permitting individuals who have not yet passed state licensing tests to teach
neglects the needs of students, because it enables adults who may not
be able to meet minimal state standards to earn teaching licenses. Louisiana should
ensure that all teachers are required to pass licensing tests — an important
minimum benchmark for entering the profession —before entering the classroom as the teacher of record.
Limit exceptions to one year.
Although suboptimal, there may be limited and exceptional circumstances under which
conditional or emergency licenses are necessary. In these instances, it is
reasonable for a state to give teachers up to one year to pass required
licensing tests. Louisiana's current policy puts students at risk by allowing teachers who have not passed required subject-matter tests to teach for up to three years under the TEP certificate.
Louisiana recognized the factual accuracy of this analysis.
6B: Provisional and Emergency Licensure
Teachers who have not passed content licensing tests place students at risk. While states may need a regulatory basis for filling classroom positions with a few people who do not hold full teaching credentials, many of the regulations permitting this put the instructional needs of children at risk, often year after year.[1] For example, schools can make liberal use of provisional certificates or waivers provided by the state if they fill classroom positions with instructors who have completed a teacher preparation program but have not passed their state licensing tests. These allowances are permitted for up to three years in some states. The unfortunate consequence is that students' needs are neglected in an effort to extend personal consideration to adults who cannot meet minimum state standards.[2]
While some flexibility may be necessary because licensing tests are not always administered with the needed frequency, making provisional certificates and waivers available year after year could signal that the state does not put much value on its licensing standards or what they represent. States accordingly need to ensure that all persons given full charge of children's learning are required to pass the relevant licensing tests in their first year of teaching, ideally before they enter the classroom. Licensing tests are an important minimum benchmark in the profession, and states that allow teachers to postpone passing these tests are abandoning one of the basic responsibilities of licensure.