State education leaders hear from public on substitute teaching requirements

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- State education officials are hearing from the public about whether or not to extend an emergency rule to allow flexibility with substitute teaching requirements due to a shortage of COVID-19. 

The emergency rule went into effect on Dec. 2, and is set to expire on April 30. 

State officials are required to hold hearings like they did to see if they current rule should be extended any further to help out schools that may need it. 

Lawmakers originally passed the emergency rule and it was set to last 150 days. 

In order to extend it, lawmakers would have to pass the extension. 

One superintendent says this is an issue her district has been dealing with and she wants this emergency rule to be passed. 

"One of the barriers that we came across was the short-term sub license of earning an Associates Degree and we has several para professionals with many, many credits but the colleges they attended do not award Associate degrees so I would like to request that that short-term sub license should be based on not just Associate's degree but on total credits as well,” Mellon School District Superintendent Rhonda Elmhorst-Friemoth said.

Right now it is not known if or when state lawmakers will take up the issue again.