LAS VEGAS – Reform can’t occur when the enemies of reform choose the people who make the rules.

One example comes from Nevada, one of many states that’s apparently experiencing a shortage of K-12 teachers this fall.

That’s always been a problem in Nevada. According to Seth Rau, policy director for the educational advocacy group Nevada Succeeds, the state’s small population has always forced it to look outside for teachers.

MORE NEWS: From Classroom to Consulate Chef: Culinary Student Lands Dream Job at U.S. Embassy in Paris

Nowhere is the need greater than in the Clark County district, which serves Las Vegas.

According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, “The school district began a new academic year Monday with almost 800 vacant teaching positions. As usual, those jobs were filled by substitute teachers, who lack the credentials and college coursework of licensed teachers but are deemed qualified to lead a classroom regardless, albeit at lower pay. What hypocrisy.”

Why is the use of these substitute teachers an example of hypocrisy?

Apparently big part of the problem is the state’s continued reluctance to allow professionals from other fields to gain teacher certification through non-traditional methods. Most teachers are still required to go through the long process of graduating from traditional teacher colleges.

As the Review-Journal put it, “The Clark County School District’s shortage of teachers is a massive policy failure compounded by protectionism. By retaining bureaucratic barriers to the licensing of educators, the system is forced to fill hundreds of classrooms with the very people those barriers are designed to keep out of schools.”

At the center of the issue is the Commission on Professional Standards in Education, a nine-member board which is appointed by the governor. Its role is to make recommendations to the state Board of Education regarding standards for teacher licensing, and its recommendations are generally adopted.

The commission tends to take a traditional approach to teacher training and licensure, and is not enthusiastic about allowing professionals from other fields make an easy transition to the classroom, according to Rau.

MORE NEWS: Know These Before Moving From Cyprus To The UK

Therefore regulations devised by the commission have blocked many attempts to broaden the certification process and get more qualified teachers into classrooms, Rau said.

“In Nevada we can use all the good teachers we can get,” Rau said. “You have to look at individual candidates. If there are people with high quality results (in their previous profession), I believe they should be approved.”

One problem is that “reform-minded people have trouble being appointed to the commission,” according to Rau.

That’s because Nevada state law allows the public education establishment to control the appointment process.

The law says the commission must be comprised of one secondary education teacher, one middle school teacher, one elementary school teacher, one special education teacher, a counselor or psychologist employed by a public school district, two school administrators, the dean of a college of education and a representative of the general public.

For the teachers and the counselor on the board, the governor must choose from a list prepared by “an employee organization representing the majority of counselors and the majority of teachers in the State of Nevada who teach in the educational level from which the appointment is being made.”

That means the nominees are chosen by teachers unions, which are great defenders of the status quo when it comes to teacher training and certification.

Meanwhile, the two administrators on the commission must come from a list of nominees prepared by “an organization of administrators for schools in which the majority of administrators of schools in this State have membership.”

So we’re probably talking about a professional association of school administrators, who also tend to be supportive of the traditional teacher training process.

And then there’s the seat reserved for the dean of a traditional teacher’s college. Of course that person is going to favor the status quo, because alternative forms of training are threats to his or her college and the jobs that it provides.

So what have those regulations produced? The commission currently includes  three teachers from the Clark County school district, one counselor from the Clark County district, one administrator from the Clark County district and one teacher from the Washoe County district.

Those are all public school employees who took the traditional route to their jobs.

Melissa Burnham, the dean of the college of education at the University of Nevada-Reno, is the president of the commission.

As the Review-Journal put it, “The state’s education systems are run by people who went through the rigmarole of an education college, pedagogy training and other licensure hoops. A lot of them believe they’ll devalue their career track if they support the idea that people from different professions can quickly become effective teachers through alternative training programs”

Again, reform can’t occur when the enemies of reform choose the people who make the rules.