Teacher Shortages: What Are We Short Of?

In October 2016, UNESCO (2017) officially announced that the world was facing a global teacher shortage. The international organization declared that 70 million more teachers would be needed to provide every primary and secondary student with an equitable and inclusive education according to its definition. Four years later, the Covid-19 pandemic struck, further complicating the already complex, longstanding challenge. Because of the ubiquitous nature of teacher shortages, more clarity is needed with how the term is defined, when the problem originated, the conditions that complicate the tenure of teachers, and the ways in which this crisis can be avoided—or at least managed (Cuban, 2001). Otherwise, teacher shortages will perpetuate because resources fall short (Cowan et al., 2016).