You are here
How Did It Get This Way? Disentangling the Sources of Teacher Quality Gaps Through Agent-Based Modeling
We use publicly available, longitudinal data from Washington state to study the extent to which three interrelated processes—teacher attrition from the state teaching workforce, teacher mobility between teaching positions, and teacher hiring for open positions—contribute to “teacher quality gaps” (TQGs) between students of color and other students in K–12 public schools. Specifically, we develop and implement an agent-based model simulation of decisions about attrition, mobility, and hiring to assess the extent to which each process contributes to observed TQGs. We find that eliminating inequities in teacher mobility and hiring across different schools would close TQGs within 5 years, while just eliminating inequities in teacher hiring would close gaps within 10 years. On the other hand, eliminating inequities in teacher attrition without addressing mobility and hiring does little to close gaps.
Citation: Dan Goldhaber, Matt Kasman, Vanessa Quince, Roddy Theobald, Malcolm Wolff (2022). How Did It Get This Way? Disentangling the Sources of Teacher Quality Gaps Through Agent-Based Modeling. CALDER Working Paper No. 259-0122
You May Also Be Interested In
How Much Do Early Teachers Matter?
Dan Goldhaber, Zeyu Jin, Richard Startz
Taking their First Steps: The Distribution of New Teachers into School and Classroom Contexts and Implications for Teacher Effectiveness and Growth
Paul Bruno, Sarah Rabovsky, Katharine O. Strunk
How Did It Get This Way? Disentangling the Sources of Teacher Quality Gaps Across Two States
Dan Goldhaber, Vanessa Quince, Roddy Theobald
See other working papers on:
Research Area: Educator preparation and teacher labor markets