Internationally, teacher shortage appears to be a major societal problem, including Sweden (Boström et al., 2022; See & Gorard, 2020). According to the United Nations (UNESCO, 2016), the world needs at least 69 million new teachers to reach the education goals of Agenda 2030. In Europe, there is a shortage of teachers in basically all countries (Federičová's, 2020; The European Commission, 2020; OECD, 2020). In Sweden, the Swedish Na-tional Agency for Education [Skolverket] (2019; 2020) and Statistics Sweden (2017a, b) have alerted to the problem. Various actors (media, politicians, opinion leaders and trade unions) have in Sweden expressed their definite and different views on the matter (Kungliga Ingenjörsvetenskap-sakademin,2020). The voices of researchers, teachers and principals are though to a large extent absent (Boström, 2023). At the same time, all stakeholders agree on both the existence of teacher shortage and the im-portance of educated teachers in schools for creating the best possible con-ditions for students to learn.
Our interest is to delineate the specific aspects of the teacher shortage's concerning causes and possible solutions according to professional groups in the field, i.e., that have concrete experience of teacher shortage and its consequences. The research questions for this study are:
• According to seven different professional groups, what are the causes and solutions of teacher shortage?
• Are there differences and similarities between the various professional groups regarding causes and solutions? If so, in what respects?
Theoretical framework for the study is ”wicked problem” (Rittel & Web-ber, 1973). It refers to complex, open-ended, and ambiguous problems that are difficult to define, have no definitive solution, and are interconnected with other problems and societal issues. Wicked problems are characterized by their complex nature, the presence of multiple stakeholders with con-flicting interests, and the lack of clear problem boundaries. The wicked problem theory emphasizes that traditional approaches to problem-solving are often insufficient for addressing complex problems. Instead, it encour-ages a more holistic and collaborative approach, involving various stake-holders, disciplines, and perspectives.
The study is based on a web survey, answered by 605 informants, consisting of 40 items about causes and possible solutions based on previous research and dialogue meetings with regional and national policy actors. The selection of participants included both academic and practical professions as well as a representation of teacher students. Data are analyzed by de-scriptive and inferential statistics. The results are reported with descriptive statistics and significance testing. Descriptive statistics presents an overall picture of the various items at a group level. Mann–Whitney U- test investigates the distinctions between professional categories.
Preliminary results indicated that items were differently relevant for different professional groups. Three professional groups diverged largely from other groups, namely health staff, uneducated teachers, and teacher train-ers. The results confirm the importance of seeing the problem as “wicked” and therefore engaging diverse stakeholders in the problem-solving process to foster collective intelligence and shared responsibility. The connection to the conferences is evident, i.e., the role and impact of educated teachers in the context of school effectiveness and improvement.