On-the-Ground—The Hidden Crisis: Why Rural Districts Face Unique Teacher Workforce Challenges
Advance Illinois’ The State We’re In 2025 report finds that across Illinois, districts are struggling to recruit and retain qualified teachers — but rural schools face a unique set of barriers. Like their urban counterparts, they report higher vacancy rates, more novice teachers, and greater reliance on provisional licenses compared to suburban peers. However, the key difference is that rural schools have the highest rates of teachers working out of field or teachers teaching in a grade or content area for which they do not hold the proper credential. This affects students’ access to high-quality instruction, especially in specialized areas such as career and technical education (CTE).
As districts grapple with recruiting, training and retaining teaching talent across the state, some rural districts are innovating out of necessity. Still, their efforts’ long-term sustainability will depend on whether state-level policy and resources align with the ingenuity happening at the local level.
The Numbers Behind the Challenge
Dr. Joshua Stafford is superintendent of Vienna School District.
Data from the recent State We’re In 2025 show how deeply shortages affect small districts. When positions go unfilled, the consequences are immediate with fewer courses offered, staff stretched thin, and higher turnover costs.
“When you lose even a single staff member in a rural district, it has a ripple effect across everything — programs, student opportunities, and the community as a whole,” explained Dr. Joshua Stafford, superintendent of Vienna School District.
The Association of Illinois Rural and Small Schools (AIRSS) whitepaper, The Chronic Rural Educator Shortage and Hopeful Actions to Address It, notes that since 2022, reliance on substitutes and retirees has grown sharply. More than half of rural vacancies are now covered by under-certified or out-of-field staff. Geography makes things worse: the farther a district is from major highways or population centers, the harder it is to attract and keep teachers. Limited resources also mean rural schools often can’t match the salaries and benefits offered by larger districts.
Why Career Technical Education is Hit Hardest
Staffing courses that provide students with academic and technical skills for high-skill, high-demand careers like Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs illustrate the problem most clearly according to John Glasgow, director of the Rural Illinois Career Tech Ed Project with AIRSS.
“It’s hard enough to get anybody to go into the education field right now… That’s especially true for CTE. There are very few programs out there specifically for those who want to be, for instance, like a shop teacher or an ag [agriculture] teacher,” he said.
As researched by a 2023 National Rural Education Association report, Why Rural Matters 2023: Centering Equity and Opportunity, school funding formulas tied to enrollment deepen the challenge. With smaller student populations, rural schools are often expected to operate in the same ways that larger districts function with less funds. Even if funding was adequate, Glasgow acknowledges that distance and size mean it may not make sense for every rural school to run every CTE field. That reality encourages schools into regional collaborations that can be difficult to sustain.
Creative Solutions Born from Necessity
Rural districts are adapting in creative ways. For example, in Vienna, Illinois the school district is making opportunities for high performing middle school teachers to move into high school classrooms while they earn new endorsements. Others tap professionals with years of industry experience to enter classrooms through alternative licensing pathways.
Stafford offered one example: “Our nursing program… the person who ran that program for 30 years here never had a PEL [Professional Educator License]. She was an RN with hospital experience and masterfully led the program. Graduates from that program now staff hospitals across the region.”
These solutions don’t solve the shortage, but they demonstrate the value of flexibility and the deep expertise already present in rural communities.
John Glasgow is director of the Rural Illinois Career Tech Ed Project with AIRSS.
The Collaboration Imperative
Unlike large suburban and urban systems, rural schools must overcome geographical distance to collaborate with neighboring districts, local business and regional organizations. This reliance on partnerships adds a layer of complexity to rural leadership, requiring skills in coordination and resource-sharing that go well beyond traditional school administration, which Glasgow acknowledges can be hard to sustain over the long haul if entities are not unified or coordinated.
But rural schools are finding other innovative ways forward. The Southern Illinois Future Teachers Coalition began around 2017 with a modest $14,000 grant to address the teacher shortage that is being experienced with targeted programming at the local level in Southern Illinois. Today it has grown into a network of 25 schools working with universities, community colleges, and regional education offices to cultivate local teaching talent that’s delivering impact. =
Stafford recalled a recent round of teacher interviews where all three candidates — from different high schools in the region — had participated in the coalition as students.
“It was just this full circle moment,” Stafford said.
Looking Ahead
The Advance Illinois the State We’re In (2025) report finds that rural districts in Illinois have higher vacancy rates in addition to educators teaching out of field. However, the findings also show that educators in rural districts tend to have higher attendance rates.
Glasgow at AIRSS emphasizes that addressing rural educator workforce challenges requires policies that account for both adequacy and access. It calls for rethinking educator preparation, supporting under-certified staff in becoming fully credentialed, ensuring rural equity in funding and curriculum, and creating stronger collaborative efforts between schools, higher education, and state agencies—strategies that Glasgow and Stafford reinforced.
And there’s no time to waste or wait on outside solutions, said Stafford. “No one’s going to ride in and save us from teacher shortage… locally and regionally, we have to act and do something.”
Additional Resources:
Maty Ortega Cruz is a Senior Community Engagement Associate for Advance Illinois.