While Japan has adopted a policy of reducing class sizes in elementary schools starting in 2022, the supply of teachers has become a policy issue. In some regions, schools are unable to supply enough teachers of sufficient quality. However, until recently, policy makers did not recognize teacher supply as a policy issue. There are two possible reasons for this. First, the supply of teachers has not been organized in terms of labor economics. Secondly, policies on teacher supply have been made at both the national and local levels without the use of specialized knowledge.
Since the 2000s, while national standards for teacher recruitment have hardly improved, local governments have gained more discretion in the number of teachers hired and their salary levels. Many local governments have slashed the employment levels of teachers in order to increase the number of teachers in the face of financial constraints. However, the overall employment situation was poor, and the hiring ratio of teachers remained high. Therefore, the number of prospective teachers did not decrease even though the employment level was lowered, and a certain level of quality of the personnel was secured despite the poor employment conditions. Later, while the economy was recovering, the demand for teachers continued on a large scale. However, the local government continued to recruit teachers mainly from new graduates, so it could not secure enough teacher applicants and the hiring rate decreased.
The failure of "evidence-based policymaking" in education policy to function well at the national and local levels, respectively, has created challenges for teacher supply. In examining the supply of teachers at the national level, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) has been in a weak position in "evidence-based policymaking" because it has not been able to navigate the politics of the legitimacy of evidence. On the other hand, in examining teacher supply at the local level, the relationship between employment levels and teacher availability was not examined. In the absence of evidence, policy decisions have been made with an emphasis on appealing to residents rather than on improving the educational environment and educational outcomes.
In educational administration research, it is necessary to analyze the issues of teacher supply by using the findings of labor economics. It is also necessary to discuss such issues as whether to hire mid-career teachers in addition to the conventional batch hiring of new graduates, and to what extent to tighten the teacher training education and qualification system. These issues are also related to the mobility of the labor market for teachers and the development of their skills after they are hired. It is also important to analyze how expertise and evidence on teacher supply are reflected in policy formulation and implementation at the national and local levels. It is believed that teacher supply policies based on ideas alone, without the use of expertise, will detract from addressing current policy issues.
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