Teachers who are hired when the school year is in full swing are not as effective as those hired before classes begin, a new study finds.
Brown University researchers analyzed data from an unnamed, 130,000-student urban district in the South from the 1999-2000 to 2009-2010 school years.
Of the 100 to 200 teachers who were hired each year after the first day of school, most went to schools that were lower-performing, served mostly African-American students, and had higher student-absenteeism rates. The late hires were more apt to be male and African-American, older, and to have entered the profession by an alternative-preparation route. They were less likely to have a master’s degree or teaching experience.
The students with late-hire teachers paid a price: They fell two months behind their peers whose teachers were hired over the summer.
The study was published in the fall issue of the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management.
