scholarly journals Do Teacher Assistants Improve Student Outcomes? Evidence From School Funding Cutbacks in North Carolina

2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 280-304 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven W. Hemelt ◽  
Helen F. Ladd ◽  
Calen R. Clifton
Keyword(s):  
North Carolina ◽  
Student Achievement ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
Effective Means ◽  
School Funding ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
School Students ◽  
Teacher Assistants ◽  
Positive Effects

This article examines the influence of teacher assistants and other personnel on outcomes for elementary school students during a period of recession-induced cutbacks in teacher assistants. Using panel data from North Carolina, we exploit the state’s unique system of financing its local public schools to identify the causal effects of teacher assistants, controlling for other staff, on measures of student achievement. We find consistent evidence of positive effects of teacher assistants, an understudied staffing category, on student performance in reading and math. We also find larger positive effects of teacher assistants on achievement outcomes for students of color and students in high-poverty schools than for White students and students in more affluent schools. We conclude that teacher assistants are a cost-effective means of raising student achievement, especially in reading.

scholarly journals Teacher Turnover, Teacher Quality, and Student Achievement in DCPS

2016 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melinda Adnot ◽  
Thomas Dee ◽  
Veronica Katz ◽  
James Wyckoff
Keyword(s):  
Student Achievement ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
Teacher Turnover ◽  
School Quality ◽  
Poor Performance ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Policy Regime ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Quasi Experimental

In practice, teacher turnover appears to have negative effects on school quality as measured by student performance. However, some simulations suggest that turnover can instead have large positive effects under a policy regime in which low-performing teachers can be accurately identified and replaced with more effective teachers. This study examines this question by evaluating the effects of teacher turnover on student achievement under IMPACT, the unique performance-assessment and incentive system in the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS). Employing a quasi-experimental design based on data from the first years of IMPACT, we find that, on average, DCPS replaced teachers who left with teachers who increased student achievement by 0.08 standard deviation ( SD) in math. When we isolate the effects of lower-performing teachers who were induced to leave DCPS for poor performance, we find that student achievement improves by larger and statistically significant amounts (i.e., 0.14 SD in reading and 0.21 SD in math). In contrast, the effect of exits by teachers not sanctioned under IMPACT is typically negative but not statistically significant.

scholarly journals Measuring Investment in Education

1996 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 9-30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric A Hanushek
Keyword(s):  
Human Capital ◽  
Student Achievement ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Education Policy ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
School Quality ◽  
Policy Instruments ◽  
Economic Research ◽  
Performance Incentives ◽  
Education Resources

Historic debates about the measurement of capital are even more complicated in the case of education and human capital. As extensive research demonstrates, education resources are not consistently related to student performance in existing elementary and secondary schools. This inefficiency in public schools implies that spending and resource measures do not accurately capture variations in school quality. This finding then has clear implications for both education policy and economic research. Because school inputs are poor policy instruments, an alternative policy focus that appears much more productive is performance incentives related to student achievement.

scholarly journals The Qualifications and Classroom Performance of Teachers Moving to Charter Schools

2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 233-268 ◽  
Author(s):  
Celeste K. Carruthers
Keyword(s):  
North Carolina ◽  
Student Achievement ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Effective Teachers ◽  
Resource Constraints ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Classroom Performance ◽  
Low Performing Schools ◽  
Traditional Public Schools

Do charter schools draw good teachers from traditional, mainstream public schools? Using a thirteen-year panel of North Carolina public schoolteachers, I find that less qualified and less effective teachers move to charter schools, particularly if they move to urban schools, low-performing schools, or schools with higher shares of nonwhite students. It is unclear whether these findings reflect lower demand for teachers’ credentials and value added or resource constraints unique to charter schools, but the inability to recruit teachers who are at least as effective as those in traditional public schools will likely hinder charter student achievement.

scholarly journals The Case for Care: Multiyear teachers are the future of mobilizing care in education

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daisy Culkins
Keyword(s):  
Parent Involvement ◽  
Student Achievement ◽  
Public Education ◽  
Small Schools ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Healthy Development ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Caring Teachers ◽  
Teacher Productivity ◽  
Shed Light

Care is essential to the healthy development of children. If care is not provided within the child’s home, the second most influential sphere within a child’s life where care can be enacted is the school. Community psychology and motivational psychology shed light into how teachers can use care to understand the child as a part of their community and use this understanding to enhance the child’s ability to learn. Education researchers have studied caring teachers to define what care looks like in practice: getting to know students personally, listening to the wants and needs of the child, their parents and the community, and using that information to aid the student in their studies. A multitude of studies have shown that these practices have measurable positive effects on students. When a teacher displays traits that their students define as caring, student achievement increases. Therefore, care is a clearly definable and measureable educational strategy that raises student achievement and should be institutionalized through education policy. Small schools and small class sizes are both effective methods of promoting care in education. However, multiyear teachers (looping) have been shown to increase student enthusiasm, parent involvement, teacher productivity and student achievement and can be implemented with no extra cost to the school. Looping is an academically effective and cost-effective way of mobilizing care in public education as supported by psychology and education research.

scholarly journals School Inputs and Educational Outcomes in North Carolina: Comparison of Static and Dynamic Analyses

1999 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 593-609 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael L. Waiden ◽  
Mark R. Sisak
Keyword(s):  
North Carolina ◽  
Student Achievement ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
Academic Research ◽  
Past Research ◽  
School Policy ◽  
Dynamic Analyses ◽  
North Carolina School ◽  
Alternative Measures ◽  
Joint Contribution

AbstractThe relationship between student achievement and school inputs has long been a subject of academic research. The general conclusion of past research is that school inputs, such as the number of teachers relative to pupils, has little impact on student academic outcomes. This paper provides a fresh look at this issue. Seventeen alternative measures of student performance in North Carolina school districts are related to a wide array of school policy inputs and socioeconomic characteristics of students and their families. Both static and dynamic analyses are performed. The key findings are (1) the school policy inputs significantly related to student achievement vary by the measure of student achievement used, (2) the joint contribution of school policy inputs to student achievement is relatively small, and (3) the results differ between the static and dynamic analyses; in particular, changes in the number of teachers relative to the number of pupils in the district have a much stronger association with student achievement in the dynamic analysis.

scholarly journals Effective resource utilization in Arkansas public schools

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 131-141
Author(s):  
Ryan Sanders ◽  
Shengfan Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Predictive Modelling ◽  
The State ◽  
Teacher Pay ◽  
Teacher Salary ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Use Of Resources ◽  
Public Data

PurposeTeacher pay in Arkansas public schools varies widely from district to district across the state. This pay discrepancy is driven by both the funds available to a district and by how these funds are allocated. A standard per student budget is given to districts across the state, but this budget can be supplemented by additional property taxes collected on property within a district. This leaves districts with more highly valued property at an advantage. Districts are free to allocate their budget for teacher pay as they see fit, with constraints on number of students per teacher and minimum teacher salary.Design/methodology/approachUsing public data available through the Arkansas Department of Education, this research investigates what variables affect student performance in Arkansas public schools using feature selection and predictive modelling and determine the cost-effectiveness associated with changing possible decision variables in terms of improving student performance.FindingsIt was found that the most cost-effective ways for districts to increase student performance are to (1) increase average teacher salary and (2) increase average years of teacher experience. This result is validated by education research, as both of these methods have been identified in literature as being effective ways to increase teacher quality and increase student performance. Furthermore, districts should consider increasing student–teacher ratio and applying the resulting savings toward teacher salaries.Originality/valueThis methodology gives a fresh perspective on the most cost-effective use of resources in publicly funded schools.

scholarly journals Can States Take Over and Turn Around School Districts? Evidence From Lawrence, Massachusetts

2017 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 311-332 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beth E. Schueler ◽  
Joshua S. Goodman ◽  
David J. Deming
Keyword(s):  
High School Students ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
School Districts ◽  
School Improvement ◽  
Group Instruction ◽  
School Students ◽  
State Takeover ◽  
Achievement Gains ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Every Student Succeeds Act

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) requires states to identify and turn around struggling schools, with federal school improvement money required to fund evidence-based policies. Most research on turnarounds has focused on individual schools, whereas studies of district-wide turnarounds have come from relatively exceptional settings and interventions. We study a district-wide turnaround of a type that may become more common under ESSA, an accountability-driven state takeover of Massachusetts’s Lawrence Public Schools (LPS). A differences-in-differences framework comparing LPS to demographically similar districts not subject to state takeover shows that the turnaround’s first 2 years produced sizable achievement gains in math and modest gains in reading. We also find no evidence that the turnaround resulted in slippage on nontest score outcomes and suggestive evidence of positive effects on grade progression among high school students. Intensive small-group instruction over vacation breaks may have led to particularly large achievement gains for participating students.

The Impact of Teacher Labor Market Reforms on Student Achievement: Evidence from Michigan

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-43
Author(s):  
Kaitlin P. Anderson ◽  
Joshua M. Cowen ◽  
Katharine O. Strunk
Keyword(s):  
Student Achievement ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Collective Bargaining ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
State Legislature ◽  
Collective Bargaining Agreement ◽  
Teacher Labor Market ◽  
Laws And Policies ◽  
Teacher Contracts ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Over the past decade, many states enacted substantial reforms to teacher-related laws and policies. In Michigan, the state legislature implemented requirements for teacher evaluation based partly on student achievement, reduced tenure protections, and restricted the scope of teacher collective bargaining. Some teacher advocates view such reform as a “war on teachers,” but proponents argue these policies may have enabled personnel decisions that positively impact student performance. Evidence on this debate remains limited. In this study, we use detailed administrative data from all Michigan traditional public schools from 2005-06 to 2014-15. We estimate event study models exploiting the plausibly exogenous timing of collective bargaining agreement expirations. Across a variety of samples and specification checks, we find these reforms had generally null results, with some evidence of heterogeneity by cohort. We investigate several possible mechanisms and conclude that districts with more restrictive teacher contracts prior to reform and districts with more rigorous use of teacher evaluations experienced more positive impacts after reform exposure.

Has It Always Been This Way? Tracing the Evolution of Teacher Quality Gaps in U.S. Public Schools

2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dan Goldhaber ◽  
Vanessa Quince ◽  
Roddy Theobald
Keyword(s):  
North Carolina ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Longitudinal Data ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Teacher Quality ◽  
Disadvantaged Students ◽  
School Students ◽  
Public School Students ◽  
History Of ◽  
Over Time

There is mounting evidence of substantial “teacher quality gaps” (TQGs) between advantaged and disadvantaged students but practically no empirical evidence about their history. We use longitudinal data on public school students, teachers, and schools from two states—North Carolina and Washington—to provide a descriptive history of the evolution of TQGs in these states. We find that TQGs exist in every year in each state, and for all measures, we consider student disadvantage and teacher quality. But there is variation in the magnitudes and sources of TQGs over time, between the two states, and depending on the measure of student disadvantage and teacher quality.

Academic Accountability In Texas Public Schools: 2003-2007

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 59
Author(s):  
Patrick Jaska ◽  
Patrick Hogan ◽  
Zhezhu Wen
Keyword(s):  
High School Students ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
Test Scores ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Public High School ◽  
School Students ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Taks Test

This study examines factors affecting test scores in a sample of thirty-seven Texas public high schools from 2003 to 2007 since the implementation of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001.   The schools were chosen based upon similar tax rates and district sizes.  The Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test was implemented in 2003 to measure the performance of Texas public high school students.  Schools are rewarded for high performance based upon the student scores on the TAKS test, which is administered once per year.  Much of the debate on student and school accountability has centered on the importance of student performance on the standardized TAKS test.  Those who oppose testing say that teachers and administrators may simply narrow the curriculum and teach the test.  Proponents of testing feel that accountability will give administrators and teachers incentives to help students learn.  As a result, many school districts in Texas have increasingly put pressure on teachers to improve test scores.

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