HARRISBURG – Governor Josh Shapiro is working to solve the education workforce shortage. Shapiro paid a visit to Farmersville Elementary School in Northampton County Monday in an effort to highlight how his proposed budget for 2025-26 would help to resolve the state’s educator shortage. The governor noted that his proposed budget would double the funding for the PA Student Teacher Support Program from a $20 million budget up to $40 million in order to help support aspiring educators to continue their careers. Shapiro cited the challenges of student teaching to be a hindrance to PA’s educator pipeline, as aspiring teachers need to student teach to complete their educator training, but in many cases they do not get paid for their work as student teachers. By raising the budget allocated to supporting student teachers with stipends, Shapiro believes that the current list of 5,500 teacher vacancies in the state can be significantly lowered.
GOV. JOSH SHAPIRO