GREENVILLE, N.C. (WNCT) – Across the state, thousands of teacher roles need to be filled, but that’s not the case for all.

“Being able to work in a school that’s fully staffed is a major attraction for teachers,” said Dr. Rodney McNeill, Greene County Schools executive director of Human Capital. “Luckily, we’re blessed to be able to offer that.”

Local student teachers and interns from surrounding universities help Greene County fill their approximately 200 teacher positions in the school district.

“Last year, we had 53 beginning teachers in our district, and 50 of them return this year,” said Dr. McNeill.

A way Greene County tries to combat teacher shortages is to focus on retention strategies.

“This year, we’re bringing about 30 new staff to the district. But only eight of those are first-year teachers who’ve never taught a day before,” said McNeill. “Some of our new hires are from the county, you know, they graduated from Greene County schools, have been working other places and have decided to come back home.”

Meanwhile, in Pitt County, recruitment is happening in different ways.

We’ve leaned heavily on international teachers this year, we partnered with three different companies,” said Dr. Kristi Rhone, Pitt County Schools assistant superintendent of Human Resources. “With those companies, we were able to hire close to about 30 teachers this coming school year for most of our vacancies.”

There are around 3,000 teacher positions in Pitt County. Less than 40 are vacant. Their recruitment efforts involved talking with college students studying in various departments other than education.

“We’ve looked at the math, the science, language arts, social studies and other departments in which people have sought a degree in but never really thought about teaching,” said Rhone.

Pitt County Schools has people ready to train new teachers to be prepared for inside a classroom.

“We have different people who are considered as subject matter experts and classroom strategists to make sure that they get those trainings that they traditionally wouldn’t have received,” said Rhone.

Officials with Greene County and Pitt County school districts say they want parents to be reassured classrooms will be supported to give your child a successful and productive school year.