Now things are about to get even more difficult, for the district and for teachers like Tomimbang.
Last month, President Trump unveiled a plan that requires Employers pay a $100,000 fee for the new H-1B visas. In his announcement, Trump specifically called high paying tech jobs which, according to him, were occupied by too many foreign workers.
However, the impact on schools and educators will be significant. According Department of Homeland Security dataMore than 20,000 educators are in the country on H-1B visas, the third most common occupation group for the program.
“I don’t have a teacher in my district who makes $100,000 a year,” Novasio says. For school districts, “paying that fee on top of a salary will simply kill the H-1B visa for education.”
The change is a hard blow for The long-term strategy of some districts. to keep teachers in the classrooms.
Many of Hardin’s current faculty are on cultural exchange or J1 visas; They must return to their home countries every few years and stay for at least a year.
When that happens, Novasio struggles to fill those classrooms. Their goal was to transition many of their current teachers to H-1B visas so they could stay for three to six years, with extension options. Now, that option is financially unsustainable.
To further add to the turmoil and uncertainty, the White House earlier this year temporarily suspended interviews for J1 visa applicants for about a monthbefore resetting the program. The pause made recruiting for this year’s gaps even more stressful.
Despite the challenges, would Tomimbang recommend that others come to the United States to teach, amid the changing immigration landscape? Yes, she says.
“It’s worth the wait, the time and the effort.”
An “unintended consequence”
When asked about the impact of the H-1B proposal on teachers, White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers told NPR that “President Trump promised to put American workers first, and this common-sense action does just that by deterring companies from spamming the system and driving down American wages.”
Novasio isn’t sure that applies to teaching, especially at Hardin. International teachers in his district, he said, earn the same as their national counterparts. Salaries are dictated by the teachers union.
The White House, in a statement, also directed NPR to the text of the president’s proclamation, which would allow the Department of Homeland Security to grant exemptions to the tariff. It is unclear whether such a waiver could be granted to schools and school districts. When asked for comment, a DHS spokesperson referred the matter to the White House.
Sasha Pudelski, advocacy director for AASA, an organization representing school superintendents that has been working to navigate the new rule in Washington, says she’s hopeful about that part of the language.
“We believe this is an unintended consequence,” he says. “And we are doing everything we can to ensure that the Department of Homeland Security exempts educators.”
However, along with the proclamation, the administration released a proposal to change H-1B visas from a lottery system to a weighted scale that gives preference to higher earners. The average teacher salary in the state of Montana. in 2023 it was $58,600well below what many tech workers earn.
This proposal, Pudelski believes, could be the most damaging to schools and educators.
“As you can imagine, education is not a particularly lucrative profession,” he says. “So we are very concerned that this could present a more significant long-term barrier to the utilization of these visas for educators.”
Meanwhile, Novasio is already looking for new teachers for next year, both abroad and at home. It is working with state officials to create an apprenticeship program for teachers and develop a stronger local pipeline.
Your district already has partnerships with local universities. “It’s not for lack of trying that we can’t fill these positions.”
He hopes people “have some empathy for those people who are packing their bags and coming to our country to help teach our children.”
