Prior research has found that economic downturns have positive effects on new teacher quality, but has not been able to determine the extent to which this relationship arises from a supply response (increased quantity or positive selection of teaching candidates) vs. a demand response (selection in hiring enabled by falling demand). In this paper,…

We use a unique dataset of student teaching placements in the State of Washington and a proxy for teacher shortages, the proportion of new teacher hires in a school or district with emergency teaching credentials, to provide the first empirical evidence of a relationship between student teaching placements and teacher shortages. We find that…

The "Quincy Method" is widely considered a successful nineteenth-century school reform. Pioneered by Francis Parker in Quincy, Massachusetts in 1875, it fostered broad pedagogic change in an ordinary school system, transforming Quincy into a renowned hub of child-centered instruction. This article revisits the reform and explores its…

The current demand for teachers outpaces the supply of teachers. Policymakers and educational administrators have altered teacher certification rules to address the teacher shortage. One such alteration is the creation of alternative certification pathways for teachers. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of alternatively…

The Government published its teacher recruitment and retention strategy in January 2019 in response to a growing teacher supply challenge in England. Four years since the publication of the teacher recruitment and retention strategy, and despite the increases in recruitment and retention that came about due to the COVID-19 pandemic, teacher supply…

We explore the dynamics of competitive search in the K-12 public education sector. Using detailed panel data on teacher hiring from Boston Public Schools, we document how teacher labor supply varies substantially across vacancies even within a single district depending on position type, school characteristics, and the timing of job postings. We…

Teachers are critical to student learning, but adequately staffing classrooms has been challenging in many parts of the country. Even though teacher shortages are being reported across the U.S., teacher shortages are poorly understood. Determining and addressing teacher shortages is difficult due to the lack of data. Neither the federal government…

For more than a decade, academics and education policy experts have raised concerns about a widespread shortage of teachers in the United States. The first wave of warnings came in response to the drastic cuts in state and local spending on education following the Great Recession. In this report, the authors use data from a wide range of sources…

The vision of every elementary, middle, and high school in the United States is to deliver an excellent educational setting to each and every student who enters their school building. Educational research overwhelmingly demonstrates that a primary factor contributing to an "excellent educational setting" is having highly qualified and…

Texas reduced new teacher preparation requirements in 2001 to allow more alternate paths to licensure. Within five years, this policy change resulted in over half the state's new teachers being alternatively licensed. Using a series of first difference models, this study examines the relationship between the increased supply of new teachers in…

This dissertation consists of three papers. In each, I use applied econometric methods and economic theory to study the American teacher workforce. The first paper evaluates a novel policy to address teacher shortages by promoting experienced school staff to be teachers of record. Controlling for demographics and baseline scores, I find that…

Understanding the nature of the "early teacher pipeline," how many and what types of individuals are pursuing a teaching credential, is critically important. Unfortunately, we conclude that the two national data collections that can be used to explore the early teacher pipeline provide an incomplete and contrasting pictures of the supply…

We develop a unifying conceptual framework for understanding and predicting teacher shortages at the state, region, district, and school levels. We then generate and test hypotheses about geographic and subject variation in teacher shortages using data on unfilled teaching positions in Tennessee during the fall of 2019. We find that teacher…

This chapter reviews the empirical research on the supply of teachers in Latin America. The first part stresses the importance of teacher labor market perspectives for understanding the supply of high-quality teachers, one challenge that most countries in the region face. The second part introduces the teacher labor market framework that guides…

Despite its lengthy history and relatively stable structure, evidence shows that the US system of doctoral education has been in a continual state of change. This change is reflected in disciplinary contexts, student demographics, professional outcomes, and the investment of external stakeholders. While the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted issues of…