Shortage of substitute teachers is no new issue, but COVID has left school administrations across the state desperate.

Multiple districts, including Warwick, have raised their substitute pay during the pandemic in order to compete for the small pool of subs available. “Supply and demand,” says Kim Ruggieri, the Human Resources Manager for Warwick Public Schools. “It became clear we weren’t as competitive as other districts.”

The Warwick School Department is currently hiring substitute teachers, as well as substitute teacher assistants, building aides, and substitute lunch aides and bus monitors. For RIDE certified substitute teachers, Warwick is paying $225 per day for the first ten days, and then $250 per day after the first ten days. For substitute teachers with a Bachelor’s degree, Warwick is paying $150 per day and $175 per day after the first ten days. For substitutes with an Associate’s degree, Warwick is paying $125 per day and $140 after the first ten days.

Substitute pay rates for WPS have increased over the past year, largely to attract the teachers that the district needs.

According to Ruggieri, the number of substitute teachers that Warwick needs can change at any given time. “During a usual year, we have day to day absences that require substitutes. COVID adds a whole other layer to this.”

In an email, Ruggieri said that since the beginning of the current school year, over 100 substitute teachers have been onboarded.

Ruggieri is also hopeful of securing more building aides. The aides ensure students are properly distanced with they arrive and leave, and help with bathroom breaks and at lunch. Warwick is offering these aide positions at $15 per hour.

When Warwick elementary and secondary schools returned to the classroom for their first week on in-person, hybrid learning in January, Pilgrim principal Gerald Habershaw spoke to the substitute shortage.

“It’s going to be an issue,” Habershaw said. Habershaw explained that in some co-taught special education classes where there is both a special education teacher and a regular teacher, which allows for some flexibility in terms of coverage. Secondary teachers are also responsible for coverage during the day, allowing those teachers that have administrative periods to cover classes that need substitutes.

Habershaw estimates that approximately 120 teachers teach at Pilgrim, with “about five or six subs”. When tenth and twelfth graders returned to the building, Habershaw says it could pose another issue, but says the best they can do is “take it one day at a time.”

One of the substitute teachers currently at Pilgrim High School is Alex Hinton.

Hinton has been a substitute for the past three years, and has found the joy of teaching even in such an uncertain year.

But it wasn’t always this way.

Hinton has found a comfortable climate and culture at Pilgrim High School. “There’s a particular gravity about this place. It’s a very low-key, mellow vibe. That’s something everybody needs right now. I really like it here,” he said in an interview last Friday.

Hinton is currently a substitute for a technology education class at Pilgrim, and will be subbing there until the end of the month.

“The school culture at some of the places that I was working at, it didn’t really jive with my philosophy. That said, some of the schools that I worked at, they were plagued by trauma, and by people who didn’t know how to support the personnel, and some places were hemorrhaging teachers. They’re not bad people, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to work there, but it just didn’t work with me.”

Hinton has witnessed, first-hand, the burnout that comes with teaching. When he worked as a long-term substitute at Blackstone Valley Prep, Hinton found himself too exhausted at the end of the day to make the commute back and forth to work, so he often spent the night in his car just to have enough energy to teach the next day.

“When I look back at how hard I worked, it’s kind of a miracle I’m still vertical. It’s kind of amazing I’m still in the teaching profession,” he said in an interview. “I’m not proud of it, but I was so overworked there that the only way I could actually meet the bare minimum of what was expected for me was to skip the commute.”

Hinton started off at the Community College of Rhode Island studying jazz piano, a major he says prepared him quite well for teaching. “It’s so fun to make music on the fly and make it with other people. I didn’t understand when someone told me that’s it’s going to be useful. And in retrospect, it was the best thing I could have done, because it was so hard. College was just what I needed, and that was the springboard that gave me an entrée to start building my resume and my career.”

From CCRI, he enrolled at Rhode Island College where he received a Spanish degree and a teaching certificate.

Hinton landed another long-term substitute position in Providence, another experience he credits with building character. “I realized if I could survive the trauma in Providence, and leave with my integrity, and still care about the kids and still have maybe an ounce of life and sparkle in my eye, I can see I’m in it for the long haul,” he said. “There’s so much they don’t teach you about being a teacher. That tough stuff in the beginning, it galvanized me for this,” he said. “Now, I feel I can actually teach people here at Pilgrim, I feel I can actually do my job as a teacher. Even as a substitute, my abilities and resources are limited, but I have to make do with that I have.”

Hinton’s teaching philosophy can be summed up in three words—“Do what works,” he said. “It’s that simple. You know in your heart of hearts when something isn’t working. If the students are suffering and you’re not having fun in the classroom, they are not learning and it’s not working. So just stop doing what doesn’t work and do what works.”

For Hinton, doing what works means acknowledging each student’s unique interests and skills.

“One of the things that I do once students take care of what they have to, I try to figure our what they actually like to do. And then I try to open doors and get out of their way. The reason I have everything here, the reason I’ve got this crazy mise-en-place is because I want to make sure I have what they need to get good experiences to get excited about learning,” he said.

Hinton emphasizes hands on, joyful learning in his classroom. To accommodate for each student’s interests, he lugs several bags to school with him each day. Contents include, but aren’t limited to, homemade snacks and treats, a guitar, colored pencils and markets, origami paper, and more.

On Fridays, Hinton will bake something for his students. Last Friday featured honey drizzled sourdough bread and pizza bites, which were well received by his students.

According to Hinton, it seems to be paying off.

“They’re in high school, and it’s tough to make a relationship at that stage. But one of the really, really cool things about this population is that when you express some interest in their development, they reciprocate. And then you start to learn about each other. It’s like planting a seed,” he said in an interview.

Hinton prioritizes mental health in his classroom, and believes in honesty, especially between teachers and students. “If we’re not real about the problems that we face and the experiences we have, how are we going to problem solve?”

Hinton says the biggest challenge he’s had to overcome, as a substitute, is vulnerability. “Do you think the grownups in the room really know what’s going on? There’s a narrative. Just trusting students to accept that I don’t have all the answers and it’s okay if I’m learning everyday. That just opens up all the doors and makes them lean in. It takes the temperature down. We’re all learning together.”