K-12 Educational Online Job Posts: Titles, Descriptions, and Qualifications

In the 1960s, federal and state legislation was enacted allowing children who are deaf and hard of hearing the opportunity to attend local public schools. Education of the deaf has been a documented struggle throughout history. Students with disabilities were denied education and discriminated against because they could not hear. A new profession called educational interpreting entered the workforce responding to an increased demand (Ball, 2013). Educational interpreting was implemented in classrooms providing free, appropriate public education (Yell & Bateman, 2019) before educators, administrators, and school districts knew how to hire for the role. Since then, educational interpreting has been laden with problems that hinder advancement and professionalization (Ball, 2013; Johnson et al., 2018; Winston, 2004). Online job posts for K-12 educational positions revealed inconsistent job recruitment practices regarding titles, levels of expertise, qualifications, and responsibility expectations. Using qualitative research methods, Minnesota job postings were collected from public Internet domains for one year. Position announcements contained four themes that were compared to industry standards and legal compliance. The findings show the educational institutions’ recruiting practices for jobs working with deaf and hard of hearing students conflict with recommended industry standard qualifications (NAIE, 2019). Research on job posts has an impact on the system of professionals who work in the educational setting such as school administrators, principals, managers, teachers, staff, students, and families