Board President Dan LeBlanc discusses a salary schedule for non-certified teachers at Wednesday's board meeting. 

Hiring and retaining qualified teachers is a problem facing every school district in the country.

The Iberia Parish School Board has come up with a way to retain some of the best to allow them to keep full-time status while earning a certification.

This week, the board approved the creation of a new salary schedule for non-certified teachers that would allow them to have full-time status in the school district and retain benefits while also pursuing their certification.

Human Resources Director Gannon Dooley said at the meeting that the Iberia Parish School District would be one of the first in the area to implement the change.

“Our goal is to come up with a scale that allows them to stay as a full-time status employee until they get fully certified,” Dooley said.

An issue that the school district has been facing is that non-certified teachers can lose their insurance and retirement benefits if they do not get renewed, which would be solved with the new salary schedule.

“These are people who are truly teaching, they get evaluated and are required to do things to get to this level and maintain this level,” Dooley said. “This would make it more stable and I think we could be the first to promote this type of schedule.”

Dooley even added that other districts are already asking about the efficacy of the schedule, which could mean that other districts in the area would promote a similar change in the future.

Although the district has recently hired student teachers from other districts, Dooley said it’s been no secret that there has been an issue with finding certified teachers recently.

“This will make us more stable and I believe will help us recruit,” he said.