The Roles We Fill:
Ascend Career Services sources and places the full range of roles school districts and educational service agencies depend on, from classroom support to district leadership. We fill Teachers, Special Education Coordinators, Paraprofessionals, and Instructional Aides, alongside leadership and administrative roles such as Business Directors, HR Directors, Facilities Directors, and Maintenance Managers. Whether a district is facing a single hard-to-fill vacancy or building an ongoing pipeline for chronically understaffed roles, we hire these or similar other roles based on each district's specific structure and needs.
Case Study
Capital Area Intermediate Unit
Paraprofessional Staffing at Scale | Enola, Pennsylvania
The Capital Area Intermediate Unit (CAIU) is one of 29 educational service agencies established throughout Pennsylvania by act of the state legislature in 1971. Headquartered at 55 Miller Street in Enola, PA, the CAIU serves school districts, families, and communities across Cumberland, Dauphin, Perry, and northern York counties — a region that includes the state capital of Harrisburg.
CAIU's mission is to achieve educational excellence through leadership, partnership, and innovation. The organization provides programs and specialized services to 24 school districts and two area vocational-technical schools, offering resources that individual districts could not practically sustain on their own. Among its most critical functions is the delivery of special education and early intervention services to children with disabilities from birth through age 20.
The Role: Special Education Paraprofessional
Paraprofessionals — also known as paraeducators or instructional aides — work alongside certified teachers in special education settings, providing direct, individualized support to students with a wide range of disabilities including autism, intellectual disabilities, emotional and behavioral disorders, and physical impairments. Their responsibilities include implementing individualized education program (IEP) goals, supporting students with daily living skills, managing behavioral challenges, assisting with communication, and enabling students to participate meaningfully in academic activities.
Despite their essential role, paraprofessionals are among the most difficult positions to recruit in American public education today.
Why Paraprofessionals Are So Hard to Recruit
Persistent Low Pay
Nationally, more than a third of full-time education support professionals earn less than $25,000 per year, and 11.7% earn under $15,000 annually — below a living wage in every state. Many candidates find comparable pay elsewhere with fewer emotional demands.
High Emotional Demand
Working with students who have significant behavioral, physical, and emotional needs requires extraordinary patience, resilience, and skill. High stress and burnout drive substantial turnover throughout the field.
Inadequate
Training & Support
Exit interviews consistently reveal that paraprofessionals leave because they feel ill-equipped and unsupported. Without structured professional development, the cycle of attrition continues.
Competition from Substitutes
Candidates who might fill paraprofessional roles are often drawn to substitute teaching, which carries similar or better pay with fewer day-to-day responsibilities.
Thin Applicant Pipelines
There are no centralized credential requirements and no dedicated university pipeline for paraprofessionals, making it difficult for organizations to find pre-qualified talent through traditional channels.
The Shortage: By the Numbers
The paraprofessional shortage is not a local phenomenon — it is a national crisis with particularly acute consequences in Pennsylvania.
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At the start of the 2024-2025 school year, 51% of public schools nationwide reported needing to fill special education positions before the year began — more than any other category.
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In Pennsylvania, the number of certified teachers has dropped 67% over the last 10 years, with schools increasingly relying on emergency permits. The special education crisis is even more severe: the number of students receiving special education services has risen nearly 20% over the last 15 years.
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Pennsylvania invested $7.76 million in 2025 in grants to expand teacher apprenticeship programs, specifically targeting paraprofessionals as an underutilized talent pool — underscoring just how critical this staffing gap has become.
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At the beginning of 2024-2025, an estimated 2,100 to 2,500 teaching and support vacancies remained open across Pennsylvania, with 38% of the state's 500 districts reporting at least one unfilled special education position.
"Finding enough teachers and paraprofessionals to fill special education vacancies feels like trying to spot a unicorn."
Kevin Rubenstein, President, Council of Administrators of Special Education
The Challenge
The Capital Area Intermediate Unit came to us facing a critical staffing shortfall. Their internal applicant flow had been limited, and traditional recruitment channels were not producing the volume or quality of candidates needed to properly staff their special education classrooms. With students' IEP services and legal obligations at stake, the CAIU needed a partner that could move quickly and deliver results.
Our Approach
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Conducted a detailed intake to understand the specific requirements — hours, locations, student populations, and qualifications needed across multiple CAIU program sites.
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Built a targeted sourcing strategy to identify qualified candidates within the CAIU's geographic footprint, focusing on individuals with relevant experience or training who were not actively applying through job boards.
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Deployed multi-channel outreach to reach passive candidates who would not have found the CAIU's postings on their own.
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Screened all candidates thoroughly for fit, reliability, and genuine interest before presenting them to the CAIU — ensuring the client's time was spent on interviews that counted.
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Supported coordination between candidates and hiring managers to keep the process moving efficiently from submission to offer.
The Results
30
Candidates Sourced and Submitted
18
60%
Candidates Hired
Hire Rate
The CAIU was able to fill a significant portion of their paraprofessional vacancies from a single, high-quality candidate slate — something their own recruitment efforts had not been able to achieve. Classrooms that had been operating shorthanded were staffed, and the students who depend on those services received the support their IEPs required.
Eighteen new paraprofessionals placed directly into CAIU classrooms — students with special needs got the support their IEPs required, and the CAIU met its staffing obligations without the prolonged vacancies that had hampered their programs.
What This Means for Similar Organizations
Intermediate Units, school districts, and special education providers across Pennsylvania and the nation are facing the same compounding pressures: rising demand for services, an eroding supply of candidates, and recruitment channels that were not designed for today's talent market. If your organization is struggling to fill paraprofessional or educational support roles, our targeted sourcing model can deliver qualified candidates where traditional approaches have fallen short.