On Wednesday, we sat down with Dan Goldhaber, director of the National Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research (CALDER), on our Education Gadfly Show podcast for thirty minutes of engaging discussion. (You can listen here and from wherever you normally get your podcasts.)
Dan is an expert on the topic of teacher effectiveness, and we wanted to deeply dive into everything we knew about research on the topic. By no means comprehensive, we nevertheless hope it affords listeners, especially those unfamiliar with some of the seminal works in this area, a great opportunity to learn more. Below is a summary of the key questions we asked and some of the most important studies we touched upon. We hope you enjoy the talk!
***
1. Are there any indicators that can help us to predict which teaching candidates will be effective in the classroom—effective at boosting achievement and other important student outcomes—especially in high-poverty classrooms?
Prior value-added performance is the best predictor of future performance, although we shouldn’t ignore other indicators, like candidates’ general intelligence, the selectivity of their college, the candidates’ race, etc. We also shouldn’t talk about these in generic terms. Some of these measures matter more for teachers in certain grades or subjects or with certain groups of students. Nothing works for all teachers in the same way.
For further reading, check out these seminal studies:
- Brian A. Jacob et al., “Teacher Applicant Hiring and Teacher Performance: Evidence from DC Public Schools,” Journal of Public Economics (October 2018)
- Dan Goldhaber et al., “What’s in a Teacher Test? Assessing the Relationship Between Teacher Licensure Test Scores and Student Stem Achievement and Course-taking,” Economics of Education Review (December 2017)
- Dan Goldhaber et al., “Screen Twice, Cut Once: Assessing the Predictive Validity of Applicant Selection Tools,” Education Finance and Policy (March 2017)
- Allison Atteberry et al., “Do First Impressions Matter? Predicting Early Career Teacher Effectiveness,” AERA Open (October 2015)
- Dan Goldhaber and Michael Hansen, “Race, Gender, and Teacher Testing: How Informative a Tool Is Teacher Licensure Testing?” American Educational Research Journal (March 2010)
2. Are there any policies or practices that have been proven to be effective at retaining great teachers in high-poverty schools? Are there any policies or practices that have been shown to be at odds with this goal?
The quality of leadership matters a lot, among other predictors. But in terms of what researchers have been able to quantify, and what kind of direct policy levers might help lift up high poverty schools, money appears to matter a great deal.
For further reading, check out these studies:
- James Cowan and Dan Goldhaber, “Do Bonuses Affect Teacher Staffing and Student Achievement in High Poverty Schools? Evidence from an Incentive for National Board Certified Teachers in Washington State,” Economics of Education Review (August 2018)
- Thomas S. Dee and Dan Goldhaber, “Understanding and Addressing Teacher Shortages in the United States,” Brookings (April 2017)
- Jeffrey Max, “Talent Transfer Initiative: Attracting and Retaining High-Performing Teachers in Low-Performing Schools,” Mathematica (2007–14)
3. Are there any policies or practices that have been shown to improve teachers’ effectiveness over time?
There’s a lot that has been shown not to work. But there is emerging evidence that teachers learn best from each other, although it’s necessary to have the right school environment and structure in place for that to prove effective.
For further reading, check out these studies:
- John P. Papay et al., “Learning Job Skills from Colleagues at Work: Evidence from a Field Experiment Using Teacher Performance Data,” (July 2015)
- Matthew A. Kraft and John P. Papay, “Can Professional Environments in Schools Promote Teacher Development? Explaining Heterogeneity in Returns to Teaching Experience,” Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (December 2014)
