As another school year ends, superintendents across the United States are staring down an autumn staffing crisis, with 1 in 8 teaching positions either vacant or filled by an underqualified educator.

The 2023 Report on Condition of Education released recently by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the statistical center within the U.S. Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences (IES), presents the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic in every dimension of American education from prekindergarten (preK) and elementary school through college and beyond.