Policy Issues June 2001 Issue 8
About This IssueThis edition of Policy Issues looks at the results of a survey that NCREL sent to superintendents in its seven-state region (Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin) last fall. The survey asked superintendents if their districts are having difficulty retaining high-quality teachers. Sixty-eight percent of the region's 3,506 superintendents responded, and many of them answered yes. The results of this survey indicate that these difficulties are being felt not only in urban and rural districts, as is widely recognized, but also in suburban districts. The two-page survey also asked superinten-dents to report on the strategies they have implemented to retain and attract high- quality teachers and on how effective these strategies have been. Across all seven NCREL states, there are school districts and schools that appear to be implementing effective strategies for keeping good teachers in the profession and for attracting new teachers. The full report on the survey results, Effective Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategies in the Midwest: Who Is Making Use of Them, will be available on NCREL's Web site (www.ncrel.org). In this edition of Policy Issues, the authors of the report present an overview of the survey results with special attention to how the location and wealth of school districts affect the use of teacher retention and recruitment strategies. The authors describe effective strategies and identify where and by whom they are being used in the region. Finally, the authors offer conclusions and recommendations for state and local policymakers. |
A Message From Gina Burkhardt,
NCREL Executive Director
Welcome to the new and improved Policy Issues--a research-based analysis of education issues. In addition to the new look, we also have changed the organization of the publication to address several topics that contribute to a single theme during the year. Our theme for 2001 is "Teacher Quality: Building Procedural Knowledge to Close the Achievement Gaps." We chose this theme because so many state and local education leaders are struggling to gain procedural knowledge about good educational policy and practice, which is essential for making research-based decisions that improve learning for all students. We hope the next four editions of Policy Issues will build a body of knowledge useful to policymakers as they make important decisions related to teacher quality and closing gaps in student achievement.
Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategies in the Midwest:
Where Are They and Do They Work?
By Debra Hare and James Heap, with Lenaya Raack
Placing a high-quality teacher in front of every child in the nation is the most important thing schools can do to improve student achievement. Yet, shortages of qualified teachers are being felt in high-poverty communities, in certain subject areas, in certain regions of the country where enrollment growth is large, and in the availability of teachers of color (American Association for Employment in Education, 1999; Lewis et al., 1999). Elimination of these shortages requires both recruiting talented individuals to teaching and making sure that good teachers stay in the profession once they are recruited. In today's education environment, the odds are not favorable that a school will see a significant return on efforts and money dedicated to recruiting, hiring, training, and supporting new teachers (Haselkorn & Fiedler, 1999).
Fortunately, however, there are effective strategies for keeping good teachers in the profession and for attracting new teachers (National Association of State Boards of Education [NASBE], 1998, 2000; Odden, 2000). Many of these retention and recruitment strategies have been used by schools and school districts in NCREL's seven-state region.
Retention Strategies
Statistics show that approximately one-quarter of all beginning teachers leave the profession in the first five years, and those rates can climb to 50 percent in high-poverty areas (National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 1996; Whitener, Gruber, Lynch, Ringos, & Findelier, 1997). Teacher-attrition rates overall nationally were 6.6 percent in 1994 (Whitener et al., 1997). Current data from Midwestern states indicate that attrition rates can be as high as 9 percent. Such high attrition rates, especially in the early years of teaching, require schools and school districts to expend tremendous energy and resources developing teachers, many of whom will eventually leave. According to the NCREL survey, however, districts are finding and adopting successful strategies for keeping high-quality teachers. One effective strategy to retain teachers is the use of new teacher support programs. (Refer to page 4 for information on the impact of state-level policies on new teacher support programs.)
Additional strategies for retaining teachers are restructuring schools to make them smaller; recruiting from, and training in, the community; and two approaches designed to treat teachers as professionals: implementing common planning time and involving teachers in decision making. These four strategies (rated "very successful" by a majority of the responding superintendents who have implemented them) may require significant changes in the way a school operates, but they do not have to be accompanied by large price tags. These strategies could be particularly attractive to small or rural school districts or low-wealth districts looking for ways to improve teaching without a large investment of new resources. Effective implementation may involve some up-front costs and allocation of staff development funds, however.
New Teacher Support Programs
Even under the best of circumstances, the first few years of teaching can be a very difficult time. Most teachers face isolation from their colleagues. New teachers often are assigned to some of the most challenging courses and classrooms. In addition, some feel they have not received enough training to handle certain aspects of their job (Lewis et al., 1999). The combination of these challenges drives too many new teachers from the profession. One response to this situation has been the adoption of programs at the local level to support new teachers. As Figure 1 shows, a majority of districts in the region are providing some level of support to new teachers.
New teacher support programs are not evenly distributed across all types of districts, however. In the seven NCREL states, urban and suburban districts are more likely to provide a support program than rural districts (see Figure 2), and small districts are least likely to provide such programs.
Why is it important for policymakers to know that some districts are less likely to support new teachers? Survey results back up other research (NASBE, 1998) indicating that providing support is a very effective way to decrease the number of new teachers who leave. A majority of responding districts providing support reported that attrition has been reduced by 50 percent or more.
Small Schools
The top-rated retention strategy is restructuring schools to make them smaller. Unfortunately, this strategy has been implemented in only 14 percent of the region's districts. The NCREL survey supports the notion that when districts restructure their schools to make them smaller, more high-quality teachers stay in those districts. Research indicates that restructuring schools to make them smaller may result in an improved environment for teaching (Bryk, 1994). For example, in the Chicago Public Schools system, an effort to improve student achievement spurred a movement to create smaller schools within big schools. In addition to improved achievement, this urban school system has found that the new, smaller schools created out of large schools have increased cooperation among teachers and have involved teachers more in the process of educational reform (Joravsky, 2000).
"Grow Your Own" Teachers
Another very successful strategy--recruiting from, and training in, the community--shows up only in 28 percent of the districts. Low-wealth, urban, and rural school districts often have difficulty attracting new teachers to their schools and keeping them there once they come. One response to this situation has been the "grow your own" teachers movement. Under this "promising alternative" (U.S. Department of Education Initiative on Teaching, 2000, p. 6), for example, a school district might provide employees--such as paraprofessionals, substitute teachers, secretaries, custodians who have exemplary work records and a commitment to teaching--tuition and other support so they can complete a teaching degree. Parent volunteers also might be included in such a program. The rationale is that it is easier to retain people who have deep roots in the community. The poorest districts (those with a majority of students receiving free or reduced-price lunches) are more likely to adopt this strategy. Urban districts also are more likely to adopt it than suburban or rural districts.
Figure 2 |
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State | Urban | Suburban | Rural |
Illinois | 68% (17) | 73.3% (129) | 44.6% (132) |
Indiana | 100% (19) | 90.9% (30) | 83.7%(128) |
Iowa | 87.5% (8) | 66.7% (4) | 41.8%(120) |
Michigan | 80% (8) | 95.6% (65) | 92.8% (232) |
Minnesota | 80% (4) | 88.9% (40) | 59.1% (127) |
Ohio | 82.4% (14) | 87.5% (98) | 92.1% (234) |
Wisconsin | 100% (10) | 81.6% (31) | 62.9% (124) |
Treating Teachers as Professionals
According to the NCES, teachers and researchers alike say that collaborative professional development--such as common planning periods, team teaching, and regularly scheduled collaboration with other teachers and administrators--is more effective than other forms (Lewis et al., 1999). Survey results validate these findings. In addition to the retention benefits claimed by superintendents, collaboration among teachers can result in improved teaching. Stronger teachers can assist weaker ones; teachers can share techniques and information; the curriculum can be better aligned to improve student learning; and multiple perspectives can be shared about one student.
Small districts (fewer than 1,000 students) are less likely to have instituted common planning time (42 percent, compared to 61 percent for districts with more than 10,000 students). Team teaching and interdisciplinary teaching also are less common in small districts and rural districts. Thirty-three percent of small districts have made these changes to teaching, while 63 percent of the largest districts have done so. Forty-two percent of rural superintendents reported adopting this approach, compared to 60 percent of suburban and 62 percent of urban superintendents.
Involving teachers in decision making also can have multiple benefits. Imple- mentation of this strategy results in fewer teachers leaving, according to a majority of responding superinten-dents. It also improves the relationship between dministrators and teachers, improves the decisions that are made, and increases the likelihood that decisions made will be feasible and well implemented in the classroom.
Impact of State-Level Policies on New Teacher Support ProgramsState-level policies have an important impact on adoption rates. A higher proportion of districts in some states have implemented support programs. These states have more comprehensive state-level policies requiring support programs. These findings support research conducted by Recruiting New Teachers Inc., which found that state mandates (but not state funding) often spur program development (Haselkorn & Fiedler, 1999). The states of Indiana and Michigan currently require support for new teachers. In Ohio, support must be offered by 2002. Indiana requires one year of support as part of the teacher-licensing system. Ohio will do the same when its rules take effect in 2002. As of fall 2000, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin provided some state-level funding to encourage districts or groups of districts to develop support programs. Illinois is the only state in the region that neither requires nor encourages, through financial incentives, its districts to implement such programs. Even without any state-level policies, however, Illinois districts have adopted support programs at a greater rate than Iowa (see Figure 1). The impact of state-level policies appears to be the greatest in small and rural districts. In the four states that do not have state-level requirements (Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin), small and rural districts are much less likely to have support programs than their urban or suburban counterparts. State-level policies also affect the inclusion of some, but not all, attributes in local support programs. Regardless of state mandates or encouragements, the vast majority of districts that have programs provide one-on-one mentoring. Other attributes also have been widely adopted in all seven states. Seventy-seven percent of the programs in the region include mentors for new teachers (ranging from 69 percent in Illinois to 83 percent in Ohio). Most programs in the region (77 percent) are mandatory for all new teachers. Additional training for mentors and new teachers is one area in which state policies appear to have had an important impact. For example, Indiana and Ohio top the region in the percentage of districts that provide training for their mentor teachers. In Indiana, this training is a requirement of districts, resulting in adoption in 61 percent of the state's programs. Under proposed rules taking effect in 2002, Ohio districts will be required to include mentor training. Currently, however, the state provides basic training to mentors on state standards for new teachers; it has provided funding to pilots for this purpose since 1994. Perhaps this provision explains why Ohio leads the region in mentor training, with 80 percent of its programs training mentors. In contrast, Illinois programs are least likely to include mentor training. Only 39 percent of Illinois districts with programs train their mentors. A majority of districts in three other states (Iowa, Michigan, and Minnesota) do not provide mentor training, and in Wisconsin only a slim majority of districts do (52 percent). Michigan is the only state to formally require that new teachers receive "intensive" professional development or additional training. State law requires programs to provide 15 days of such training in the first three years of teaching. More than 80 percent of Michigan's programs include this attribute, compared to 57 percent of Iowa's programs and the regionwide average of 66 percent. State policies make a difference in the kind of support that is provided for mentor teachers. Indiana and Ohio were most likely to provide release time and compensation for mentors. State funding of $600 per mentor is available in Indiana, where 76 percent of the programs compensate their mentor teachers. Ohio has provided funding to pilot programs for compensating mentors and other purposes during the last seven years, resulting in equally high levels of mentor compensation at 71.8 percent. These figures compare with a low of 34 percent in Illinois and a regional average of 53 percent. Release time is encouraged in Indiana, resulting in adoption in 59 percent of that state's programs. Ohio ranked second in the region with 47 percent. |
Recruitment Strategies
In order to ensure a high-quality teacher in every classroom, the region's school districts need to both retain and attract high-quality teachers. Efforts to recruit teachers are less widespread than efforts to retain teachers. Only three of the strategies included in the survey have been adopted by a majority of the region's districts: offering support to beginning teachers, hiring under temporary licenses, and recruiting aggressively from teacher-preparation institutions.
Six recruitment strategies were rated "very successful" by superintendents: placing high-demand teachers above entry level on the salary scale, aggressively recruiting from teacher-preparation institutions, retraining current staff, offering support to beginning teachers, providing salary-schedule credit for higher education experience, and providing salary-schedule credit for professional experience outside of teaching.
Temporary Licenses
Hiring under temporary licenses often is viewed as a marker for teacher shortages and teacher quality in a state. It typically is assumed that teachers hired under a temporary license are less qualified than teachers who are fully certified or licensed to teach and that if a fully qualified individual were available, he or she would have been hired instead. A variety of factors, however, may lead a district to fill an open position using this mechanism.
Use of this approach is widespread in the NCREL region. Fifty-eight percent of the districts regionwide report hiring teachers under temporary licenses. Use does vary considerably by state, however, from a high of 71 percent in Wisconsin to a low of 39 percent in Illinois. Across the region, the largest districts and the poorest districts are more likely to make use of this strategy. Seventy-four percent of districts with more than 10,000 students made use of this approach, compared to 58 percent of districts with less than 1,000 students. Teachers are hired under temporary license in 61 percent of the region's poorest districts (in which the majority of students receive free or reduced-price lunch) and in 45 percent of the region's high-wealth districts (in which less than 10 percent of students receive free and reduced-price lunch).
Connections With Teacher Preparation Programs
A majority of districts across the region have aggressively recruited new teachers at teacher-preparation institutions. College and universities that train teachers often hold employment fairs and other events, giving school districts an opportunity to court prospective teachers. Districts have actively recruited through phone calls, e-mail, and flyers directed to college and university deans, department chairs, and student service offices. More than 1,200 districts--ranging from 44 percent of the districts in Wisconsin to 58 percent in Michigan--report engaging in activities of this sort.
Recruitment at colleges and universities is almost twice as likely to be undertaken by urban and large (enrollment more than 10,000) school districts than by small and rural districts that may be hiring only a few teachers. Aggressive recruitment efforts may be too costly in terms of time and resources to make such efforts worthwhile for smaller districts.
Establishment of school-university partnerships also is much less likely to happen in small and rural districts. A large urban area may have five or six teacher-preparation institutions and one or two school districts. By comparison, a rural region of a state may have one teacher-preparation institution and more than ten school districts.
Flexibility in Compensation
Three of the top-rated recruitment strategies involve more flexible use of the established salary schedule in order to pay some individuals more money. The first of these strategies is to place high-demand teachers above the entry level on the salary scale. This approach allows superinten-dents to respond to the marketplace. Use of this strategy would allow a new science teacher, for example, to be paid more than a new elementary teacher, even though they might be at the same schedule level based on the academic degrees they hold and the number of years they have been teaching. Under the second and third strategies, a superintendent also may increase a salary offer for a desirable individual by giving him or her "credit" on the salary scale for professional experience outside of teaching or higher education teaching experience. In some cases, these actions may be in violation of contract agreements with teachers unions, which generally govern the particulars of a salary schedule.
Use of these approaches varies to some extent across the region. Three states--Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin--seem to make the most use of these mechanisms. Indiana is least likely to use them. In general, a small percentage of the region's districts have taken these steps in order to attract teachers, perhaps because of local contract agreements with teachers unions.
Retraining Current Staff
One promising strategy that has been advanced for districts having difficulty recruiting staff, particularly in shortage areas, is to retrain current staff. The idea is to take good teachers in a surplus area (such as elementary education or social studies) and support their efforts financially, and otherwise, to become certified to teach in shortage areas (such as science or special education). Although 47 percent of superinten-dents found this approach "very successful," only 22 percent of the school districts engaged in the practice. Retraining of current staff was practiced slightly more often in rural districts (23 percent), compared to 17 percent in urban districts and 9 percent in suburban districts.
Conclusions and Recommendations
Ths evidence presented in this report shows that many districts are taking effective steps to ensure that their classrooms are led by high-quality teachers. Research shows that recruitment and retention of high-quality teachers can be enhanced by actions of school and state leaders. Many of these actions can be taken without significant new resources.
The following conclusions and recommendations summarize some of the report's findings and provide options for policymakers to consider.
Conclusion 1:
Districts throughout the region have implemented successful strategies for retaining and recruiting teachers. The most effective of these strategies include support programs for new teachers, smaller schools, more collaboration and involvement of teachers, flexible use of the salary schedule, "growing their own" teachers, and partnerships between teacher-preparation institutions and school districts.
Recommendations:
- Keep small schools small.
State policy or practice should not force small schools and districts to become bigger. States should help small or rural schools come up with creative ways to address the challenges they face. They also should examine whether funding formulas encourage schools to become bigger. - Increase the flexibility of pay schedules.
Many districts are manipulating current salary schedules in order to respond to market forces. - Support adequate funding for teacher-preparation programs. States that have not revised their funding policy for teacher-preparation programs since the late 1980s should consider doing so. During the past decade, the majority of teacher- preparation programs in the nation have been redesigned to include more intensive clinical experiences for teachers in training than in the past. State and higher education institutional funding policies often do not recognize the extra costs that such training entails, particularly in remote rural settings. These extra costs should be outweighed by the benefits of higher retention rates from better prepared teachers.
Conclusion 2:
States without state-level requirements for new teacher support programs have fewer programs, particularly in rural districts. These programs are less comprehensive on average and include fewer components.
Recommendation:
- Adopt policies that ensure equal access to high-quality new teacher support. In those states without state-level requirements for new teacher support, rural and small districts are less likely to have new teacher support programs. In Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan, where such programs are mandated, rural and small districts adopt new teacher support programs at much greater rates. Although much has been written about new teacher support programs in urban areas, much less is known about rural approaches. Further information should be gathered from these states about how small and rural districts provide support to new teachers, and appropriate policies should be adopted based on this information.
Conclusion 3:
Aggressive recruitment at institutions of higher education and school-university partnerships are effective approaches that are much more likely to occur at urban and large districts than at small or rural districts.
Recommendation:
- Encourage partnerships between higher education institutions and K-12 schools. Such partnerships can be effective not only in matching prospective teachers with districts in need but also in improving the preparation of teachers. Resources may need to be provided to make this strategy more feasible in rural areas, where they currently occur much less often.
Policy Q&A Issues
How critical is the teacher shortage? Statistics show that approximately one-quarter of all beginning teachers leave the profession in the first five years, and those rates can climb to 50 percent in high-poverty areas (National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 1996; Whitener, Gruber, Lynch, Tingos, & Fondelier, 1997). According to the NCES, teacher-attrition rates nationally were 6.6 percent in 1994 (Whitener et al., 1997). Current data from Midwestern states indicate that attrition rates can be as high as 9 percent. Such high attrition rates, especially in the early years of teaching, require schools and school districts to expend tremendous energy and resources developing teachers, many of whom will eventually leave the profession.
How widespread is teacher attrition in the Midwest? Last fall, many superintendents in NCREL's region (Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin) reported that they are having difficulty retaining high-quality teachers. These difficulties are being felt not only in urban and rural districts but in suburban districts as well.
What are some effective strategies for retaining teachers? A majority of districts in the region are providing some level of support to new teachers. In addition, four strategies were rated "very effective" by a majority of adopting superintendents: restructuring schools to make them smaller; recruiting from, and training in, the community; and two approaches designed to treat teachers as professionals: implementing common planning time and involving teachers in decision making.
What are effective strategies for recruiting teachers? Six recruitment strategies were rated "very successful" by superintendents: placing high-demand teachers above entry level on the salary scale, recruiting aggressively from teacher-preparation institutions, retraining current staff, offering support to beginning teachers, providing salary-schedule credit for higher education experience, and providing salary-schedule credit for professional experience outside of teaching.
Are these effective retention and recruitment strategies being used universally? Many strategies rated as "very effective" are less likely to have been adopted by small or rural districts. In contrast, large or urban districts are more likely to have adopted many of these strategies.
Are recruitment and retention strategies being adopted equally? Efforts to recruit teachers are less widespread than efforts to retain teachers. Only three of the strategies included in the survey have been adopted by a majority of the region's districts: offering support to beginning teachers, hiring under temporary licenses, and recruiting aggressively from teacher-preparation institutions.
Do state-level policies have an impact on teacher support program adoption rates? States without state-level requirements for new teacher support programs have fewer programs, particularly in rural districts. These programs are less comprehensive on average, and they include fewer components.
References
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Haselkorn, D., & Fiedler, E. (1999). Learning the ropes: Urban teacher induction programs and practices in the United States. Belmont, MA: Recruiting New Teachers Inc.
Joravsky, B. (2000). From dream to reality: Three Chicago small schools. Chicago: Small Schools Coalition.
Lewis, L., Parsad, B., Carey, N., Bartfai, N., Farris, E., Smerdon, B., & Green, B. (1999). Teacher quality: A report on the preparation and qualifications of public school teachers (NCES 1999-080). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics. Available online: http://nces.ed.gov/pubs99/ 1999080.pdf
National Association of State Boards of Education. (1998). The numbers game: Ensuring quantity and quality in the teaching work force. Alexandria, VA: Author.
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Odden, A. (2000). New and better forms of teacher compensation are possible. Phi Delta Kappan, 81, 361-366.
U.S. Department of Education Initiative on Teaching. (2000). Eliminating barriers to improving teaching. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education.
Whitener, S. D., Gruber, K., Lynch, H., Tingos, K., & Fondelier, S. (1997). Characteristics of stayers, movers, and leavers: Results from the teacher followup survey 1994-95 (NCES 97-450). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics. Available online: http://nces.ed.gov/pubs97/97450.pdf
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