Oakland school district holds job fair due to teacher shortage

OAKLAND, Calif. (KGO) -- The Oakland Unified School District held a job fair for potential candidates Friday afternoon.

Like many districts, Oakland is experiencing a shortage of teachers.

Tony Handy already works at another school district, but wants to teach closer to Oakland. "I want to go actually where needed. I feel that many students today can use more role models that are on time all the time," he said.

Dozens of candidates showed up for the job fair, which was held at 1000 Broadway Street.

The Oakland Unified School District is hoping this will help them find many qualified teachers. School starts in about a week. "I'm new to the public school system. I'm from the Bay Area, but I was raised in the private school system and I'm currently teaching in sort of the private sector," Alexandra Williams-Fleck said.

Teachers specializing in certain areas have been hard to find. "Math, science, special education, P.E., particularly for women or female P.E. teachers, world language, Spanish, bilingual," Director of Talent Development Kafi Payne said.

Oakland still needs to hire about 70 teachers. This shortage is going on in several districts in California. Baby Boomers are retiring and pink slips given year after year discouraged many people from continuing or getting into the field of education.

The number of credentials awarded in California dropped severely during the years of the Great Recession. "We're going to be much closer. We will definitely be much closer and we're going to get as far as we can and we're going to continue this work," Payne said.

Handy was offered a position as a teacher at Sequoia Elementary Friday afternoon and was given a few days to accept the job.