We analyze the placement and attrition patterns of teachers by preparation programs and document large differences in the rate at which teachers exit both their schools and the profession. These differences are robust to within-school comparisons. Moreover, assumptions about turnover and the persistence of program effects prove important for predicting the likely changes in student achievement that would result from varying the proportion of graduates from the most and least effective programs within a state.
AldemanC.CareyK.DillonE.MillerB.SilvaE. (2011). A measured approach to improving teacher preparation. Washington, DC: Education Sector.
2.
American Federation of Teachers. (2012). Raising the bar: Aligning and evaluating teacher preparation and the teaching profession. Washington, DC: Author.
3.
AnsellS. E.McCabeM. (2003, January9). Off target. Education Week, 57-72.
4.
BarnesG.CroweE.SchaeferB. (2007). The cost of teacher turnover in five school districts: A pilot study. Washington, DC: National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future.
5.
BeckN.KatzJ. N.TuckerR. (1998). Taking time seriously: Time-series-cross-section analysis with a binary dependent variable. American Journal of Political Science, 42(4), 1260-1288.
6.
BormanG. D.DowlingN. M. (2008). Teacher attrition and retention: A meta-analytic and narrative review of the research. Review of Educational Research, 78(3), 367-409.
7.
BoydD.GrossmanP.LankfordH.LoebS.WyckoffJ. (2006). How changes in entry requirements alter the teacher workforce and affect student achievement. Education Finance and Policy, 1(2), 176-216.
8.
BoydD.GrossmanP.LankfordH.LoebS.WyckoffJ. (2008, May). Who leaves? Teacher attrition and student achievement (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series, 14022). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
9.
BoydD.GrossmanP.LankfordH.LoebS.WyckoffJ. (2009). Teacher preparation and student achievement. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 31(4), 416-440.
10.
BoydD.LankfordH.LoebS.WyckoffJ. (2005). The draw of home: How teachers’ preferences for proximity disadvantage urban schools. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 24(1), 113-132.
11.
ClotfelterC. T.GlennieE.LaddH.VigdorJ. (2008). Would higher salaries keep teachers in high-poverty schools? Evidence from a policy intervention in North Carolina. Journal of Public Economics, 92(5-6), 1352-1370.
12.
ClotfelterC. T.LaddH. F.VigdorJ. L. (2007). Teacher credentials and student achievement: Longitudinal analysis with student fixed effects. Economics of Education Review, 26(6), 673-682.
13.
ClotfelterC. T.LaddH. F.VigdorJ. L. (2011). Teacher mobility, school segregation, and pay-based policies to level the playing field. Education Finance and Policy, 6(3), 399-438.
14.
CoopersmithJ. (2009). Characteristics of public, private, and Bureau of Indian Education elementary and secondary teachers in the United States: Results from the 2007-2008 Schools and Staffing Survey (No. NCES 2009-324). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education.
15.
DeAngelisK. J.WallA. F.CheJ. (2013). The impact of preservice preparation and early career support on novice teachers’ career intentions and decisions. Journal of Teacher Education, 64(4), 338-355.
16.
GansleK. A.NoellG. H.BurnsJ. M. (2012). Do student achievement outcomes differ across teacher preparation programs? An analysis of teacher education in Louisiana. Journal of Teacher Education, 63(5), 304-317.
17.
GoldhaberD.GrossB.PlayerD. (2011). Teacher career paths, teacher quality, and persistence in the classroom: Are public schools keeping their best?Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 30(1), 57-87.
18.
GoldhaberD.LiddleS.TheobaldR. (2013). The gateway to the profession: Assessing teacher preparation programs based on student achievement. Economics of Education Review, 34(1), 29-44.
19.
HenryG. T.KershawD. C.ZulliR. A.SmithA. A. (2012). Incorporating teacher effectiveness into teacher preparation program evaluation. Journal of Teacher Education, 63(5), 335-355.
20.
ImazekiJ. (2005). Teacher salaries and teacher attrition. Economics of Education Review, 24(4), 431-449.
21.
JacksonC. K. (2009). Student demographics, teacher sorting, and teacher quality: Evidence from the end of desegregation. Journal of Labor Economics, 27(2), 213-256.
22.
JacobB. A. (2007). The challenges of staffing urban schools with effective teachers. The Future of Children, 17(1), 129-153.
23.
JenkinsS. P. (1995). Easy estimation methods for discrete-time duration models. Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, 57(1), 129-138.
24.
KaiserA. (2011). Beginning teacher attrition and mobility: Results from the first through third waves of the 2007-2008 Beginning Teacher Longitudinal Study (No. NCES 2011-318). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education.
25.
KaneT. J.RockoffJ. E.StaigerD. O. (2008). What does certification tell us about teacher effectiveness? Evidence from New York City. Economics of Education Review, 27(6), 615-631.
26.
KeigherA. (2010). Teacher attrition and mobility: Results from the 2008-2009 Teacher Follow-Up Survey (No. NCES 2010-353). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education.
27.
KoedelC.ParsonsE.PodgurskyM.EhlertM. (in press). Teacher preparation programs and teacher quality: Are there real differences across programs?Education Finance and Policy.
28.
MihalyK.McCaffreyD. F.SassT. R.LockwoodJ. R. (2013). Where you come from or where you go? Distinguishing between school quality and the effectiveness of teacher preparation program graduates. Education Finance and Policy, 8(4), 459-493.
29.
MurnaneR. J.OlsenR. J. (1989). The effect of salaries and opportunity costs on duration in teaching: Evidence from Michigan. The Review of Economics and Statistics, 71(2), 347-352.
30.
MurnaneR. J.OlsenR. J. (1990). The effect of salaries and opportunity costs on length of stay in teaching: Evidence from North Carolina. The Journal of Human Resources, 25(1), 106-124.
31.
Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. (2012). Compensation Technical Working Group Final Report. Olympia, WA: Author.
32.
PleckiM. L.ElfersA. M.NakamuraY. (2012). Using evidence for teacher education program improvement and accountability: An illustrative case of the role of value-added measures. Journal of Teacher Education, 63(5), 318-334.
33.
ReiningerM. (2012). Hometown disadvantage? It depends on where you’re from: Teachers’ location preferences and the implications for staffing schools. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 34(2), 127-145.
34.
RockoffJ. E. (2004). The impact of individual teachers on student achievement: Evidence from panel data. The American Economic Review, 94(2), 247-252.
35.
RockoffJ. E.JacobB. A.KaneT. J.StaigerD. O. (2011). Can you recognize an effective teacher when you recruit one?Education Finance and Policy, 6(1), 43-74.
36.
RonfeldtM. (2012). Where should student teachers learn to teach? Effects of field placement school characteristics on teacher retention and effectiveness. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 34(1), 3-26.
37.
RonfeldtM.LoebS.WyckoffJ. (2013). How teacher turnover harms student achievement. American Educational Research Journal, 50(1), 4-36.
38.
RonfeldtM.SchwartzN.JacobB. (2013). Does pre-service preparation matter? Examining an old question in new ways. Unpublished manuscript.
39.
RutledgeS. A.HarrisD. N.ThompsonC. T.IngleW. K. (2008). Certify, blink, hire: An examination of the process and tools of teacher screening and selection. Leadership and Policy in Schools, 7(3), 237-263.
40.
ScafidiB.SjoquistD. L.StinebricknerT. R. (2007). Race, poverty, and teacher mobility. Economics of Education Review, 26(2), 145-159.
41.
TaylorL. L.FowlerW. J. (2006). A comparable wage approach to geographic cost adjustment (No. NCES 2006-321). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education.
42.
U.S. Department of Education. (2011). Our future, our teachers: The Obama Administration’s plan for teacher education reform and improvement. Washington, DC: Author.
43.
WooldridgeJ. M. (2011). A simple method for estimating unconditional heterogeneity distributions in correlated random effects models. Economics Letters, 113, 12-15.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
