On the first day of orientation, 800 new Philly teachers were met with cheers and a request: Please don’t quit

Eight hundred brand-new Philadelphia teachers and counselors arrived for their first day of work Wednesday, and Superintendent Tony B. Watlington Sr.’s administration wanted to set the tone for the 2024-25 school year.

So two lines of assistant and associate superintendents, chiefs and deputy chiefs, and Watlington himself formed outside the School of the Future in Parkside, armed with noisemakers and their teacher voices, greeting the ground troops who will eventually fan out over the Philadelphia School District’s 216 schools to teach the city’s 113,000 students.

The superintendent said he knew that the job they had accepted would be two things: difficult and rewarding.

“We want them to know that they’re going to have some good days and great days and some days that can be not so great,” Watlington said. “But we want them not to quit.”

The district has 95% of its teaching positions filled — the same as this time last year. Officials did not provide a number of open teaching positions, but, given the size of the district’s teaching force, that translates to several hundred unfilled classrooms.

“We could use more teachers,” Watlington said at the start of the five-day new-hire orientation for teachers and counselors. “We’re going to keep our foot on the gas between now and Aug. 26, which is the first day of school. The good news is every classroom will be covered.”

Due to a nationwide teacher shortage and deep decline in the number of teachers graduating from Pennsylvania schools of education, not every open job will be filled by a permanent teacher on the first day, Watlington said, but he said some combination of certified teachers now working in the central office and credentialed substitute teachers will temporarily cover the vacancies.

Some teachers may have a first year like Debora Carrera’s.

Carrera, the city’s chief education officer and a former principal, and assistant superintendent, walked into her first year teaching feeling confident. She was 21, at Potter-Thomas Elementary in North Philadelphia, the same district school she attended as a child.

“I thought I was prepared, y’all. I was ready to conquer the world,” said Carrera.

She had 30 students in her class, many of whom were reading below grade level, and no aide or new teacher coach. The teacher next to her, a veteran, had advice for Carrera: “Don’t come to school looking too cute.”

Because she was passionate and identified with her students, because she had learned about lesson planning and differentiation in college, she thought the students would just do what she told them to.

Things didn’t work out that way. Carrera struggled in Room 220, situated over the lunchroom and so hot she wore summer dresses even in winter. Three students in particular were “struggling academically, and that struggle displayed itself in behavior. They fought a lot.”

On one particularly difficult day, Carrera decided she couldn’t go on. She walked out of the room.

“I was 21 years old, and I said, ‘I’m going to go be anything else,’” Carrera said. “I didn’t think about what was going to happen to the children.”

The school’s assistant principal just happened to bump into Carrera as she walked toward the exit. She brought her into the faculty lounge and gave her advice. The next day, Carrera came back.

“My class wasn’t different, but I was,” Carrera said. “I wasn’t going anywhere. I was committed to my students, and I was committed to their success. When things get hard for you, and I guarantee they will, you have to make a decision, and the decision is: Choose to stay. Because they are children that look like me, that talk like me, that need you.”

By the end of the year, Carrera’s students were the ones crying — because they didn’t want to leave her.

Many of Philadelphia’s students come to school with challenges, but they also come with great promise, Watlington reminded the crowd packed into the gym bleachers for an opening pep talk.

“It’s really important that we see geniuses and really smart kids in front of us,” Watlington said.

Daniella Castro isn’t new to teaching, but new to the district. After five years working at a charter school, she accepted a position as a fourth-grade special education teacher at Southwark Elementary School in South Philadelphia.

She chose the district because she was excited to work at a school that’s within walking distance of her home, and because she feels like her proficiency in Spanish can help her students.

“I wanted to be more included in my community,” said Castro.

She’s mostly thrilled, but also a bit worried, Castro said: “I’m nervous, because I just want to be the best.”

Though Sandra Spencer is a brand-new teacher, she’s a district veteran, with years of experience working as a paraprofessional at Overbrook Educational Center and Prince Hall Elementary.

Spencer was always interested in teaching, but got a business degree, then raised a family. Her children attended OEC, and Spencer volunteered there so much someone eventually encouraged her to apply to be a teacher’s aide. She started working for the district in 2005.

She loved the work, and when the district and Philadelphia Federation of Teachers joined forces to start the Para Pathway program to help paraprofessionals transition into teaching, Spencer enrolled. She now has a master’s degree in education from La Salle University and, as of Aug. 26, her own classroom at OEC.

She’ll be teaching kindergarten, and yes, she loved the drumline-and-big-boss welcoming party.

“It feels awesome,” said Spencer. “It’s almost a dream.”