Our informal research has shown that these five programs, as well as three additional online college of education programs that we interviewed, have no trouble filling up classes with students. Working professionals seeking to change careers to the teaching profession and current K-12 educators who wish to move up to higher-level leadership positions are the primary market segments that enroll in these online programs.

Add to the mix a well-publicized K-12 teacher and administrator shortage in our nation, and the time seems ripe for increasing our country’s teacher population. But is there really a shortage?

"What people have not kept up with is the fact that there has been an explosion of enrollments in schools of education, and we have more than sufficient people to place in the job shortages that are out there," says David Imig, President and CEO of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education. "The problem is that the people who are enrolled in schools of education don’t necessarily want to teach where the vacancies are. They (vacancies) are across the country; they are in low-performing schools, in challenging schools; they are in fields or areas that don’t match what they (prospective K-12 teachers and administrators) studied in college."

Mildred Hudson, CEO of a non-profit organization called Recruiting New Teachers, says that today’s teacher shortage is primarily confined to "high poverty urban and rural communities. If you look at suburbia, you see highly qualified teachers who tend to stay in the profession." Urban areas tend to have high populations of newly hired teachers, and a high percentage of these teachers end up dropping out of the teaching profession, adds Hudson. "The same problem to recruit teachers for high poverty urban and rural communities that was identified 10 to 15 years ago, exists today."