Super-Subs

What makes 1,000 Angelenos, many with strong résumés, line up to substitute teach?

Photos by Bob Riha, Jr.

Los Angeles substitute teacher Robert Rivers uses a technique for controlling unruly classes that could have been inspired by Hollywood: He phones home. One recent day teaching sixth grade, he had to resort to his cell phone three times. No parents were there, but he talked with two brothers and a grandmother, seeking help to make a child stop disrupting the class.

"Even when it doesn't get that student to behave, calling home helps me keep order because the other kids don't want me to pull out my phone," he explains.

Rivers—tall, solid-looking, with a baritone voice and a powerful presence—gets less lip than most substitutes. But even he struggles to keep the lid on a room full of students who know they won't have him next week.

Rivers has held responsible jobs in the Navy, the Urban League, and IBM. Why take so much grief? Because he loves to see a student light up with understanding. "If I reach one kid a day, I'm happy," he says.

L.A.'s substitute legion in-cludes former aerospace engineers, curriculum designers, and authors. And there are 1,000 more on a waiting list, eager to tackle L.A.'s tough classes.

Elsewhere, school systems are beating the bushes and lowering standards to find warm bodies to work as substitutes. The Substitute Teaching Institute at Utah State University says 90 percent of districts have trouble finding enough.

What's different about L.A.?

Two words: pay and benefits. A day-to-day substitute in Los Angeles makes $156 a day, or $211 after 21 days. Those who work 100 days a year get full health insurance the following year.

That's probably the best package in the country, says Doug Provencio, a veteran Oakland, California, substitute who leads NEA's Substitute Teachers Caucus. A government survey of large school districts found that their average substitute pay was $87.50 a day last year. Most substitutes get no health insurance. Utah State reports that a majority of states only require a high school diploma for a substitute.

But the substitute teacher is a critically important educator. The Institute estimates that from kindergarten to high school graduation, students spend a full year with substitutes.

In L.A. and some other communities, substitute teachers belong to the educators' union—in L.A., it's United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA), a joint NEA-AFT affiliate. Their pay and conditions are bargained collectively. That's why the pay package is attractive to people with strong credentials, says Leonard Segal, the substitutes' representative on the UTLA board of directors. Unfortunately, he adds, most local teachers' unions leave substitutes to fend for themselves.

Caucus president Provencio says a good contract requires that a substitute who works a certain number of days with one class be paid like a permanent teacher. That way, administrators are not tempted to fill positions with long-term substitutes.

Some unions have bargained training for substitutes into their contracts. In Wisconsin, the NEA-affiliated Wisconsin Education Association Council runs its own course for substitutes, covering everything from protecting yourself from blood-borne pathogens, to what to do when you can't find the permanent teacher's lesson plan. The course has graduated thousands since it was founded in 1996 with a grant from the NEA Foundation for the Improvement of Education. More than 150 have completed a new, online version.

Respect is another vital condition for getting and keeping good substitutes. "I wish more teachers understood that substitutes want to be treated like staff," says Dorothy Hearn, a substitute in Montgomery County, Maryland, who was a permanent teacher for six years. "There are times when you go into the staff room and nobody will talk to you." Other times, she does feel appreciated by teachers and by her students. Once, at the end of a day with a sixth-grade class, she'll never forget how "all of a sudden students started standing up. I thought there was some kind of trouble. Then they all started applauding!"

—Alain Jehlen

For more: Visit NEA Substitute Teachers Caucus; and the National Substitute Teachers Alliance. "Standing in Your Shoes," by Doug Provencio (NEA Professional Library), helps permanent teachers prepare for a substitute, and helps substitutes do their job well.