Outta Here

Teachers are leaving the profession. We’ve heard this before. But who are they, and why are they going? Our sister publication, Education Week, recently analyzed data from the U.S. Department of Education’s Baccalaureate and Beyond, the first major federal study to track college graduates entering the workplace. The feds surveyed 10,080 students who earned bachelor’s degrees in 1992 and 1993 and followed up with them a year later and again in 1996 and 1997. Among Education Week’s findings about those students who went on to teach: One out of five novice teachers left the profession after three years. New teachers who scored In the top quartile on the SAT or ACT were twice as likely to leave. Beginning teachers who did not participate in an Induction program were twice as likely to leave.