HARRISBURG — A stipend aimed at getting more student teachers into Pennsylvania schools and easing the commonwealth’s educator shortage is working, education advocates and experts say.
But demand for the $30 million program is outstripping available funds. In his latest budget proposal, Gov. Josh Shapiro asked lawmakers to increase the appropriation by $5 million — an amount that would likely still leave many applicants unserved.
Meanwhile, schools across the state still don’t have enough teachers.
Pennsylvania requires people to complete at least 12 weeks of student teaching before leading a classroom, and they generally aren’t paid for that work. The stipend aims to ease the financial burden that can come with a full-time, unpaid position. It gives $10,000 to student teachers on a first-come, first-served basis if they commit to teaching at a Pennsylvania school — either public or private — for three years after graduation.
The Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency, which administers the grant program, told Spotlight PA that 4,199 student teachers benefited during the 2024-25 and 2025-26 school years. (Those who taught last semester had their grant awards and payments delayed by the state budget impasse.)
But far more prospective teachers wanted to participate — PHEAA saw 7,793 applicants overall in those two academic years.
Education advocates say the program has been genuinely beneficial to the state.
Giving student teachers a wage “really does help schools have a just more steady flow of new and qualified educators entering their doors,” said Emily Sagor, who works with the education coalition PA Needs Teachers.
She and other advocates just think the program hasn’t reached its full potential.
“Our big push right now is that we just continue to invest in this program. Like, we know that the main issue with this program is that we need more money so all qualified student teachers are able to receive a stipend,” Sagor said.
PA Needs Teachers comprises several education advocacy groups around the state and is led by national nonprofits Teach Plus and the National Center on Education. Sagor, a former classroom teacher, is also policy manager at the Pennsylvania chapter of Teach Plus.
The group releases assessments of teacher shortages in Pennsylvania’s 67 counties, compiled by Penn State professor Ed Fuller. It reported, for instance, that Philadelphia needs about 3,577 additional teachers, calling the city’s shortage “severe.” Philadelphia’s “teacher supply” has sunk by 41% over the past decade, the report said, and nearly 12% of its teachers left in the 2023-24 year.
Nearby Montgomery County, which is significantly wealthier, has a “mild” shortage. But across the state, tiny and rural Forest County, which has little in common with Philadelphia on its face, also has a “severe” shortage. It issued no teaching certificates in 2024, but needs five new teachers — a lot, given that one small school district serves the entire county.
The coalition recently put out a report, authored by a group of educators on policy fellowships, that notes teacher turnover is worst in lower-wealth urban and rural districts, as well as in districts that serve higher proportions of students of color and those living in poverty. It also noted that early-career teachers are the likeliest to leave their positions.
It cites the work of several data scientists, including Fuller, who noted that more than 280 public schools in Pennsylvania lose more than 20% of their teachers annually.
He told Spotlight PA that Pennsylvania’s teacher shortage likely had its roots in the 2008 recession, which saw a significant number of teacher layoffs. Wages for teachers were already relatively low, and the prestige accorded to the job started declining. All of that created “a kind of snowball effect where these problems pile up on each other,” Fuller said.
He estimates Pennsylvania’s teaching complement hit a low around 2018 and has been relatively stagnant since.
A spokesperson for PHEAA said it doesn’t yet have data on the number of stipend recipients who have transitioned into Pennsylvania’s teacher workforce, though they noted the agency is working with the state Department of Education to track it.
In a Penn State report that Fuller co-authored last year, he pointed to another side effect of high attrition and low supply of credentialed teachers: Districts begin to rely more heavily on teachers with emergency permits, which aren’t as rigorous as regular teaching certifications. The state issues them only when schools can’t find fully qualified applicants. The Penn State report noted that in the 2021-22 school year, for instance, Pennsylvania issued more emergency permits than normal certifications.
That’s another benefit of the stipend, Sagor said — the participants are by design going to be fully certified teachers. The idea is to get “qualified candidates into the door who are prepared.”
The stipend started recently, under Shapiro’s administration. Passed in the 2023 state budget as a $10 million program, lawmakers have since grown it to $30 million for this academic year.
In his latest budget proposal, the governor pitched adding $5 million, less than the previous two year-over-year increases.
Advocacy groups have been generally supportive of the ask, though many think the number should be higher — PA Needs Teachers, for instance, has said the line item should be around $50 million.
Fuller said there is “a lot of hope that the student teacher stipend will work and it’ll make a difference.” He estimated there will be enough data next year to begin assessing its impact.
Any funding increase will have to be agreed to by Republicans who control the state Senate. A spokesperson for the caucus didn’t make any commitments.
“Gov. Shapiro’s budget proposal spends too much money without protecting Pennsylvania’s future fiscal stability,” they said. “With Senate Appropriations Committee budget hearings underway, we are currently examining the budget proposal. Our Senate Republican Caucus is focused on looking for more government efficiencies and respecting taxpayers by controlling the growth of state spending.”