Teacher Quality,

1
Teacher Quality, Recruitment and Retention
www.teacherpolicyresearch.org
2
Policy Challenge

• How can public schools
• Attract potentially excellent teachers to
  teaching, especially in traditionally
  difficult-to-staff schools?
• Provide the skills and experiences that help
  potentially excellent teachers develop into
  excellent teachers in those schools?
• Retain strong teachers, especially in
  traditionally difficult-to-staff schools?

The Narrowing Gap in NYC Teacher Qualifications
and its Implications for Student
Achievement Boyd, Lankford, Loeb, Rockoff,
Wyckoff
3
Paper Overview

• Changing qualifications in NYC, 2000-05
• Role of teachers in student achievement
  distinguishing effective teachers through
  measured characteristics
• Implications of improved observed qualifications
  for student achievement

4
Data

• NYC teachers 2000-2005
• teacher qualifications cert exam scores, cert
  areas, initial routes into teaching, SAT scores,
  experience, BA institution ranking
• Students
• Achievement scores in math and reading (ELA)
  grades 3-8
• student fixed effects
• Classroom
• Class size, average student characteristics
• Schools - categorized
• Free Lunch Quartiles in 2000, also by year and by
  race/ethnicity and achievement

5
LAST Exam Failure Rate of Elementary Teachers by
Poverty Quartile, 2000-2005
6
LAST Exam Failure Rate of New Teachers by
Poverty Quartile, 2000-2005
7
Percent of Teachers with Fewer than Three Years
Experience, NYC Elementary Schools, 2000-2005
8
Policies Contributing to Change

• In 2000 the NYS Regents created alternative
  certification routes
• In 2000 the NYC Department of Education created
  its first cohort of Teaching Fellows
• Effective September 2003, NYS Regents eliminated
  temporary licenses for uncertified teachers with
  very limited exceptions
• Between 2000 and 2003 starting salaries in NYC
  increased from 33,186 to 39,000

9
New Teachers by Pathway, 2000-2005
10
Average Certification Exam Scores, First Taking
(2004 Passing 220,SD30)
11
Measuring the Contributions of Individual
Teachers to the Achievement Gains of the Students
They Teach

• Challenge
• Disentangling teacher value-added from the range
  of other factors that affect student achievement
  (e.g., students own attributes, attributes of
  students classmates, school-level factors).

Measuring How Various Attributes of Teachers
Affect the Achievement Gains of the Students They
Teach
12
Changes in Grades 4 5 Math Attributable to
Teacher Qualifications, Rich and Poor Deciles
2001 2005
13
Characteristics of Teachers in Poorest Quartile
of Schools by their Value-Added Attributable to
Observed Qualifications
14
Paper Summary

• Gap in teacher qualifications narrowed
  substantially between 2000 and 2005
• Likely the result of changes in the state and
  city policies governing teachers
• Changing qualifications appears to have improved
  student achievement

15
Policy Challenge

• How can public schools
• Attract potentially excellent teachers to
  teaching, especially in traditionally
  difficult-to-staff schools?
• Provide the skills and experiences that help
  potentially excellent teachers develop into
  excellent teachers in those schools?
• Retain strong teachers, especially in
  traditionally difficult-to-staff schools?

Who Leaves? Teacher Attrition and Student
Achievement Boyd, Grossman, Lankford, Loeb
Wyckoff
16
Paper Overview

• First-year teachers who are less effective in
  improving student test scores are more likely to
  leave teaching and transfer within NYC than are
  their more effective peers in the same schools.
• The first-year differences in effectiveness are
  meaningful in size.
• Among those teachers transferring, there is a
  systematic sorting related to the effectiveness
  of teachers that disadvantages students in
  low-scoring schools.

17
Attrition Rates of First- and Second-Year
Teachers by School Groupings Based on Student
Performance, Grades 4-5, 2000-2006
18
How does turnover affects the overall quality of
the teacher workforce?

• Important factors
• Typical gains from experience
• How the average quality of the entering cohort
  differs from those who entered earlier
• How the effectiveness of those who leave teaching
  compares to their peers who remain

19
Measuring the Contributions of Individual
Teachers to the Achievement Gains of the Students
They Teach
In the following analysis we only compare
teachers in the same school having the same level
of prior experience.
20
Attrition Rates of First- and Second-Year
Teachers by Teacher Groupings Based on Math
Value-Added, Grades 4-5, 2000-2006
21
Average Within-School Differences in
Effectiveness, Teachers Making Transitions
Compared to Those Remaining in the Same School,
2000-2006
22
Average Within-School Differences in
Effectiveness, Teachers Making Transitions
Compared to Those Remaining in the Same School,
2000-2006
23
Attrition Rates of First- and Second-Year
Teachers by Groups Based on Teacher Value-Added
and School-Level Student Achievement, Grades
4-5, 2000-2006
24
Average Within-School Differences in
Effectiveness, Teachers Making Transitions
Compared to Those Remaining in the Same School,
Grades 4-5 2000-2006
25
Characterizing the Moves of First-Year Teachers
Transferring within NYC, Grades 4-5 Teachers
Grouped by Math Effectiveness
26
Average Within-School Differences in
Effectiveness, Teachers Who Transferred Within
NYC Compared to Teacher in New Schools Who Did
Not, Grades 4-5
27
Policy Challenges

• Targeted retention policies could be far more
  beneficial than indiscriminant policies aimed at
  reducing attrition across the board.
• The apparent churning of many less effective
  teachers needs to be better understood and
  addressed, possibly through better screening of
  applicants.
• Many relatively effective teachers leave their
  initial placements, disproportionately leaving
  schools with relatively low-performing students
  and transferring to schools with relatively more
  higher-performing students, exacerbating
  achievement gaps.

28
Papers and other documents available at
www.teacherpolicyresearch.orgWe are grateful
to the New York City Department of Education and
the New York State Education Department for the
data used in these papers.
29
(No Transcript)
30
Cumulative Attrition Rates for Entering NYC
Teachers, 2000-2004
31
Attrition Rates of First- and Second-Year
Teachers by Teacher Groupings Based on ELA
Value-Added, Grades 4-5, 2000-2006
32
Estimating Effects of Teacher Attributes

• Aisgty - Aisg(g-1)t(y-1) ß0 Siy ß1 Cty
  ß 2 Tty ß3
  
• pi pg py eisgty
• Change in student achievement is a function of
• student, grade and year fixed effects,
• time varying student characteristics,
• time varying classroom characteristics, and
• teacher characteristics.
• Specification checks
• Achievement levels with school fixed effects
• Only those with fewer than 3 years of experience
• Alternatives for missing teacher test scores

33
Measuring Teacher Effectiveness
students prior-year scores
students own attributes
attributes and prior scores of students
classmates
school fixed-effect
teacher-by-year fixed effect
Empirical Bayes approach is used to adjust
estimates of teacher effects for estimation error.
Comparisons between teachers are made only within
schools for teachers having the same level of
experience.