Creating a New Teaching Profession
Edited by Dan Goldhaber and Jane Hannaway
(Urban Institute Press, 2009, Forthcoming)

Education is a human capital enterprise: research shows teachers are the most important schooling factor affecting student learning. Today, our nation’s schools are under tremendous performance pressure. U.S. students continue to trail behind their peers in other industrialized countries. Improving the performance of the teacher workforce is no longer just a moral imperative— it is also an economic imperative. This volume draws on research evidence provided by leading education scholars, who underscore that current systems for training, hiring, retaining, and rewarding teachers not only are imperfect, but are detrimental to building the best teacher workforce possible. They propose such major reforms as remaking teacher training systems and using private-sector approaches to modernize recruitment and compensation. More info»

  

Education Finance and Policy
(Volume 4, Issue 2 - Spring 2009 & Volume 4, Issue 3 - Summer 2009)

Recent editions of Education Finance and Policy feature research by CALDER experts. In these issues researchers examine the consequences of teacher absences in public schools and the impact of a policy intervention designed to reduce absences; investigate the pattern of incentives for work versus retirement in 6 different state teacher pension systems and the efficiency and equity consequences of the defined benefit systems; review teacher professional development policies implemented in various states and the effectiveness of these policies; and examine the potential impact of NBPTS certification on teachers' career paths and teacher mobility.

  
Alternative Routes to Teaching
Mapping the New Landscape of Teacher Education
Edited by Pam Grossman and Susanna Loeb
(Harvard Education Press, 2008)

There is wide consensus among school administrators, policy makers, parents, and scholars alike on the need to ensure an equitable distribution of high quality teachers across schools and classrooms. But what are the most effective strategies for preparing teachers? Over the past 20 years, alternative certification programs have emerged as a major pathway for teacher preparation, and have contributed to a heated debate over how best to recruit, train, and to support qualified teachers. Susanna Loeb and Pamela Grossman review research on alternative certification, focusing on the trade-offs implicit in teaching routes. More info »