Staying Put: Positive Spillovers on Teacher Retention from a Middle School Science Initiative

Abstract

Teacher shortages, especially in high-need subjects and schools, are a long-standing issue in many districts, and teacher attrition is a key driver. In this paper, we examine the association between a professional development-focused science initiative and middle school science teacher retention in the nation’s largest school district, NYC. We use detailed teacher-level administrative personnel data on 19 cohorts of teachers from NYC and UA program participation data and estimate likelihood of attrition using a discrete-time hazard model. UA teachers are roughly 3.8 percentage points less likely than similarly situated non-UA teachers to leave their school the following year. This study contributes to the limited evidence on how professional development-focused programs can promote teacher retention in hard-to-staff subjects and schools.

Keywords: science teacher education, middle grades teacher education, recruitment and retention, professional development, urban teacher education

JEL Classification: I21, J63