VALDOSTA — The national teacher shortage has begun to affect Head Start programs in Valdosta and surrounding counties.

The East Coast Migrant Head Start Project operates 42 direct educational campuses and six delegates across 10 states providing early childhood education services for approximately 3,000 farmworker children between 6 weeks to 6 years old, according to their website.

ECMHSP was established in 1974 through a grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Berenice Malagon, director of communication, said the migrant project’s current personnel includes 334 teachers, 200 bus monitors which is a minimal number to operate. Ideally, the program would have 400 teachers and 250 bus monitors.

“If we are able to hire more staff across the states that gives us an opportunity to open more classrooms and serve more children and families,” Malagon said. “We have experienced difficulties finding teachers that meet the bilingual requirement to help support children’s learning.

“We addressed the teacher shortage by offering an increased pay rate but the pandemic greatly affected the mission of the migrant program, as many experienced teachers decided to retire while others choose to work remote during this time.”

In September 2022, the ECMHSP Educational Campus in Valdosta opened to serve farmworker families in Echols, Lowndes, Brooks, Berrien, Lanier and Cook counties.

Currently, the campus serves more than 70 children with only five teachers on staff.

Karla Kildare, Valdosta Educational Campus director, said, “We are doing everything that we can and using all resources to recruit teachers.

“We have one of the highest pay rates in the area almost (for) Head Start and day care programs, starting at $16 an hour for certificated teachers.”

Kildare said the campus must have at least nine teachers to operate all four available classrooms.

Now, ECMHSP offers $5,000 incentives for new hires with the help of the federal government. The $5,000 bonuses are part of a federally funded program to hire more teachers in 10 states, including Georgia.

In Valdosta, the $5,000 bonus for Head Start early childhood teachers has been advertised throughout Valdosta State University, Wiregrass Technical College, Valdosta-Lowndes Chamber of Commerce, LinkedIn, Indeed and local billboards.

The Valdosta Educational Campus had an established student-teaching agreement with Valdosta State University College of Education; however, the struggle to retain students as teachers after graduation is difficult.

“Since we are in a small city it is difficult to motivate graduates to stay in the area, especially bilinguals, where there are better opportunities in large cities,” Kildare said.

ECMHSP offers competitive pay rates with at least one bonus a year based on performance, medical, dental and life insurance, retirement benefit packages, tuition assistance, bonuses for hired referrals and bonuses for seasonal work.

Malagon said, “By closing certain classrooms, the lives of our farmworkers and their children are greatly affected. Our mission is to support these families as they work to provide food for all of us.”

In many cases, when mom and dad work on the farm, their children need a place to be so the need for teachers is critical, organizers said.

“We provide educational, health and nutrition to their children.

We prevent the children from unnecessary exposure to the dangers of pesticides and other hazardous conditions of agriculture work,” Kildare said. “It is critical for us to have qualified teachers that understand the necessity and the mission of the migrant project.”