More People to Switching to Teaching Career

These teachers, with real-life experience and often with deep knowledge of their subjects, are answering a call to service that is part of a strategy to dramatically boost the size and quality of the teaching work force.

Career switchers make up about one-third of the ranks of new teachers, and that number has jumped in the past decade. Now, as the recession deepens, even more people are deciding to become teachers.

The New Teacher Project, which helps people switch from other careers to the classroom, reports a 44-percent increase in the number of people who have applied to its teaching fellows programs this year.

Not everyone who applies will make it into the classroom. But the avalanche of applications is encouraging to the Obama administration, which has a plan to dramatically increase the number of teachers. And career-changers are an important part of the plan.