Shawnee Mission School District
A student raises her hand in a modern classroom at Rhein Benninghoven Elementary, which was built in 2017. Shawnee Mission wants to rebuild some of its oldest elementary schools with rising maintenance costs.
The middle of a pandemic is a tough time to ask taxpayers for more money. But Shawnee Mission is dealing with a crisis of teacher morale and aging buildings in need of maintenance.
Teacher burnout didn’t start with the pandemic.
Shawnee Mission teachers have felt the stress for years. Middle and high school teachers in Shawnee Mission teach one more class per day than educators in other Johnson County districts. Last year, they told the administration that what they were doing was unsustainable as contract talks broke down.