Posted on 05/27/2009 6:41:58 AM PDT by decimon
A study forthcoming in the Journal of Labor Economics suggests that high-quality teachers tend to leave schools that experience inflows of black students. According to the study's author, C. Kirabo Jackson (Cornell University), this is the first study to show that a school's racial makeup may have a direct impact on the quality of its teachers.
"It's well established that schools with large minority populations tend to have lower quality teachers," Dr. Jackson said. "But it is unclear whether these schools are merely located in areas with a paucity of quality teachers, whether quality teachers avoid these schools because of the neighborhood or economic factors surrounding a school, or whether there is a direct relationship between student characteristics and teacher quality."
Dr. Jackson's findings suggest that it's not neighborhoods keeping high-quality teachers away; it's the students—and it's directly related to their race.
"This is particularly sobering because it implies that, all else equal, black students will systematically receive lower quality instruction," Jackson said. "This relationship may be a substantial contributor to the black-white achievement gap in American schools."
The study focused on the Charlotte-Mecklenberg school district in North Carolina. In 2002, the district ended its race-based busing program, which distributed the district's minority population across its schools. When the policy ended, some schools had a large and sudden inflow of black students. Since the racial makeup of the schools changed suddenly but the neighborhood and economic factors surrounding them stayed the same, Jackson could test the impact the student body itself had on teacher quality.
Using data supplied by the North Carolina Education Research Data Center, Jackson found that schools that had an increase in black enrollment suffered a decrease in their share of high-quality teachers, as measured by years of experience and certification test scores. Teacher effectiveness, as measured by teachers' previous ability to improve student test scores, decreased in the black inflow schools as well. The change in quality for each school generally occurred in the same year that the busing program ended, indicating that teachers moved in anticipation of more black students.
"This study implies teachers may prefer a student body that is more white and less black," Jackson says.
Black teachers were slightly more likely than white teachers to stay in the schools that experienced a black inflow, the study found. However, those black teachers who did leave black schools tended to be the highest qualified black teachers. So the decline in quality was somewhat more pronounced among black teachers than white teachers.
Just what it is about black students that pushes high-quality teachers away is hard to pin down, Dr. Jackson says. It could be that teachers are reacting to notions about black students' achievement or income levels.
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C. Kirabo Jackson, "Student Demographics, Teacher Sorting, and Teacher Quality: Evidence from the End of School Desegregation," Journal of Labor Economics 27:2.
Since 1983, the Journal of Labor Economics has presented international research that examines issues affecting the economy as well as social and private behavior. The Journal publishes both theoretical and applied research results relating to the U.S. and international data. And its contributors investigate various aspects of labor economics, including supply and demand of labor services, personnel economics, distribution of income, unions and collective bargaining, applied and policy issues in labor economics, and labor markets and demographics.
My wife teaches in an inner-city elementary school that is in one the worst areas of the city. The surrounding area is a body-dump zone, to give you an idea.
In her school, and another she taught at, the minority administrators were run over rough-shod by the Black PANTHERS teaching in the school.
EVERYTHING becomes a race issue for these teachers, and it creates an adversarial environment. (In a school that is 60% black, 35% hispanic, 5% white)
The Panther Teachers (and the Wanna be’s) are too busy pushing a Black-centric POLITCAL AGENDA, and getting all they can for THEMSELVES, to care much about what happens to the students under thier charge. They push the white teachers, AND the black administrators to the point that everyone is afraid to say or do anything, and nothing gets done.
Luckily, my wife has learned to stand against them when they play the Race Card, and isn’t afraid to remind them that SHE, TOO, is a minority (American Indian) when they start that crap. And it always stops them in thier tracks, because they don’t know how to react to it.
Several of the worst are set to retire this year and next, so hopefully it will calm down soon.
As tuition goes up so does the problem.
MEant to say:
As the tuition goes UP the prblem goes AWAY.
They leave.
At each grade level the tuition goes up.
Too often parents expect SCHOOLS and TEACHERS to raise their kids. It doesn’t work that way.
I think you mentioned several key factors for success. In particular “the parents back the teachers up”.
Good observations
I give your wife credit.
I pray for her continued success.
Kids NEED teachers like her!
Teachers choose schools according to personal safety. The race part is incidental to this, as 17% of the population commits 50% + of the crime. Need a slide rule?
SOME on this board. Just the most vocal ones.
They did not take race out of the equation in this study. Skin color is not the issue. Culture, fatherlessness, etc ARE the issue.
Good for her.
Culture? What culture? You mean black culture?
And the fact they happen to be black has nothing to with it unless of course they are whining about being "discriminated" against. Then race matters...How does that work again?
“OTOH, the Bush girls went to PUBLIC schools.”
In Midland...You can bet your grandmother’s silverware that they would not have gone to government school in D.C.
Being “Black” — culturally black — is indeed a significant part of this issue.
That’s why all black schools worked so well back a hundred years ago. Because in those schools “being Black” was defined as being a good, disciplined student.
For the past fifty years “being Black” was come to be defined as being the ever-victim, never acting like a white or a Tom. Always showing some diss to authority, especially when teh authority is not Black or Tom.
typo- “Always showing some diss to authority, especially when the authority is not a Black or is a Tom.”
Is it possible that teachers are relucant to seek contracts in schools where they risk getting shot, stabbed, raped, or assaulted? And is it a coincidence that so many of those schools have high percentages of “minority students?”
The Dem primary for Governor of Virginia is in 2 weeks. One of the candidates is Terry McAuliffe -— he has been running an ad in this part of the state (I don’t know about other areas) that claims VA determines the number of prison cells that will be needed in 15 years by the failure rate of 3rd graders. I thought I heard it wrong the first time the ad ran, but it has been running so often that I now have it practically memorized.
We live in a high poverty, rural area. The student population of my daughter’s elementary school is primarily black and hispanic. Unfortunately, from what I am learning, the even handed “expect the same from everyone regardless of race” attitude prevalent in the school does not continue into the middle school.
You don’t have to run from the Mexicans in the Midland school district.
I don’t think you’re a fool...but I do think that it is unusual that you are allowed by the administration to show “tough love” or that there is enough discipline in the school for you to function effectively. I know a lot of teachers who would like to do what you are doing but the bureaucrats make it impossible...they also make it dangerous to work in their schools.
And th echances of your recommendations being adopted are...;-)
Teacher effectiveness, as measured by teachers' previous ability to improve student test scores, decreased in the black inflow schools as well.
Student test scores do not increase SOLELY because of the skill of a teacher, so a fundamental premise of this survey is undermined. After all, its possible from these results to posit that an increased proportion of minorities reduce teacher effectiveness.
A personal note - I taught for four years in a small, Catholic school in No VA. I found I had an aptitude for teaching, loved kids and made a difference. So I thought I’d eventually try to teach in an inner-city school (Norfolk, VA) to see if I could help in some way kids who really need it. I went back to school (Regent Univ - Pat Robertson’s place) and worked hard in a Master’s program and did well. That is until I got into it with another “teacher” taking an on-line course over EBONICS of all stupid things. I said ebonics had no place in schooling - our job was to prepare these kids to function optimally in society so they could achieve as much as possible. I was called a RACIST and after sending this person’s comments to everyone in the chain of command (including Robertson’s office), I was chastised by the dean! My prof ripped me too for putting up a fight. SO, screw the inner city schools, screw Regent Univ and Robertson and if I go back to teaching, it will be at a private and/or faith-based school where I won’t get called a racist when considering the good of the kids - and they wonder why their community and culture is all messed up! Tell it to Oprah!!!!!!
It’s all about culture. Do the students want to learn?
Are teachers fleeing districts that have an influx of Asian students???
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