Officials at several school districts in Texas are traveling to Mexico to interview potential teacher candidates to meet the growing demand.

The ‘Exchange Teachers’ Visiting International Teacher Program was approved by the ESC-2 Board of Directors in December 2021.

District officials in South Texas are conducting interviews in the Mexican state of Tlaxcala.

“There are 65 candidates available right now. It does not mean we are going to use all 65, it’s just what the district is needing at this time,” said ESC-2 Associate Director of Curriculum, Instruction & Accountability, Dr. Daniel Ceballos.

District leaders say COVID-19 exacerbated the demand for educators. The need goes beyond teachers in core subjects like math and science.

“Now it’s really English teachers, special ed teachers, bilingual teachers, those are in high demand,” said Kingsville ISD Superintendent Dr. Cissy Reynolds-Perez.

“There may be potential other vacancies, because usually about May or April is when people start deciding if they are going to retire or not and so we just need to have a pool ready to make sure that we can fill those vacancies quickly and easily.”

Region 2 directors are looking forward to bringing highly qualified candidates into the classrooms through this specialized partnership.

“Making sure that all the shortages positions are taken care of, I think it’s going to be important not only to the teachers but the kids and the communities there,” said Dr. Ceballos.

“And what a better way than to have somebody also, an international teacher that comes in to also learn about the different culture as well, I think it’s an added benefit.”

This story was originally reported by Reyna Rodriguez at KRIS in Corpus Christi, Texas.