Teacher hiring and retention
Pre-Service Teacher Quality and Workforce Entry
Using rich longitudinal data from one of the largest teacher education programs in Texas, we examine the measurement of pre-service teacher (PST) quality and its relationship with entry into the K–12 public school teacher workforce. Drawing on rubric-based observations of PSTs during clinical… more →
More Than Shortages: The Unequal Distribution of Substitute Teaching
Classroom teachers in the US are absent on average approximately six percent of a school year. Despite the prevalence of teacher absences, surprisingly little research has assessed the key source of replacement instruction: substitute teachers. Using detailed administrative and survey data from… more →
Year-Round School Calendars: Effects on Summer Learning, Achievement, Parents, Teachers, and Property Values
Year-round school calendars take the usual 175-180 instruction days of the school year and redistribute them, replacing the usual schedule – nine months on, three months off – with a more “balanced” schedule of short instruction periods alternating with shorter breaks across all four seasons of… more →
Preferences, Selection, and the Structure of Teacher Pay
Human-capital formation in school depends largely on the selection and retention of teachers. I conduct a discrete-choice experiment with responses linked to administrative teacher and student records to examine teacher preferences for compensation structure and working conditions. I calculate… more →
Testing, Teacher Turnover and the Distribution of Teachers Across Grades and Schools
Topics: Policy, Politics, and GovernanceTeacher turnover has adverse consequences for student achievement and imposes large financial costs for schools. Some have argued that high-stakes testing may lower teachers’ satisfaction with their jobs and could be a major contributor to teacher attrition. In this paper, we exploit changes in… more →
The Unavoidable: Tomorrow's Teacher Compensation
States and localities cannot avoid dealing with issues of teacher compensation. Not only is it the largest budget item for most local governments, but it is the place of largest leverage for improving the quality of schools. Fortunately, consistent research evidence directly informs ways to… more →
The Teacher Residency: An Innovative Model for Preparing Teachers
Newly emerging teacher residency programs offer an innovative approach to recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers for hard-to-staff schools. This report summarizes the features of these programs and research about their practices and outcomes.
A Coming Crisis in Teaching? Teacher Supply, Demand, and Shortages in the U.S.
Recent media reports of teacher shortages across the country are confirmed by the analysis of several national data sets reported in this paper. Shortages are particularly severe in special education, mathematics, science, and bilingual/English learner education, and in locations with lower… more →
Teacher Turnover: Why It Matters and What We Can Do About It
Without changes in current policies, U.S. teacher shortages are projected to grow in the coming years. Teacher turnover is an important source of these shortages. About 8% of teachers leave the profession each year, two-thirds of them for reasons other than retirement. Another 8% shift to… more →
Minority Teacher Recruitment, Employment, and Retention: 1987 to 2013
This study examines the extent and sources of the minority teacher shortage—the low proportion of minority teachers in comparison to the increasing numbers of minority students in the school system. Using the National Center for Education Statistics’ Schools and Staffing Survey/Teacher Follow-Up… more →
Diversifying the Teaching Profession: How to Recruit and Retain Teachers of Color
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentResearch illustrates the importance of greater teacher diversity because of the substantial benefits teachers of color provide to all students, and to students of color in particular. Studies also show that policies must focus more effectively on retention of teachers of color, if diversity in… more →
Taking the Long View: State Efforts to Solve Teacher Shortages by Strengthening the Profession
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentMuch is known about how to attract, develop, and retain a strong and stable teacher workforce, and states across the country are taking action to address their teacher shortages in ways that strengthen their overall teacher workforce.
California’s Positive Outliers: Districts Beating the Odds
Despite wide achievement gaps across California between students from different racial and socioeconomic backgrounds, some school districts have excelled at supporting the learning of all their students. This analysis identifies these positive outlier districts—those in which students of color,… more →
Teacher Accountability Reforms and the Supply and Quality of New Teachers
Topics: Policy, Politics, and GovernanceIn recent years, states have sought to increase accountability for public school teachers by implementing a package of reforms centered on high-stakes evaluation systems. We examine the effect of these reforms on the supply and quality of new teachers. Leveraging variation across states and time… more →
Teacher Evaluation and Teacher Turnover, New Evidence from District of Columbia Public Schools
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentFew topics in education policy have received more attention than teacher turnover—and rightly so. The cost of losing a good teacher can be substantial and is born most directly by students. It is now widely recognized that teachers differ considerably in their ability to improve student outcomes… more →
Is Effective Teacher Evaluation Sustainable? Evidence from DCPS
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentTen years ago, many policymakers viewed the reform of teacher evaluation as a highly promising mechanism to improve teacher effectiveness and student achievement. Recently, that enthusiasm has dimmed as the available evidence suggests the subsequent reforms had a mixed record of implementation… more →
Teacher evaluation for accountability and growth: Should policy treat them as complements or substitutes?
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentTeacher evaluation policies seek to improve student outcomes by increasing the effort and skill levels of current and future teachers. Current policy and most prior research treats teacher evaluation as balancing two aims: accountability and skill development. Proper teacher evaluation design… more →
The effects of higher-stakes teacher evaluation on office disciplinary referrals
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentDespite frequent political and policy debates, the effects of imposing accountability pressures on public school teachers are empirically indeterminate. In this paper, we study the effects of accountability in the context of teacher responses to student behavioral infractions in the aftermath of… more →
The Factors of Teacher Attrition and Retention: An Updated and Expanded Meta-Analysis of the Literature
Building on a previous meta-analysis of the literature on teacher attrition and retention by leveraging studies with longitudinal data and a modern systematic search process, this updated comprehensive meta-analysis synthesizes findings from 120 studies on the factors of teacher attrition and… more →
Improving Student Teachers’ Feelings of Preparedness to Teach Through Recruitment of Instructionally Effective and Experienced Cooperating Teachers: A Randomized Experiment
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentPrior work suggests that recent graduates from teacher education programs feel better prepared to teach and are more instructionally effective when they learned to teach with more instructionally effective cooperating teachers. However, we do not know if these relationships are causal. Even if they… more →