Study: Minority Students Often Struggle Under Worst Teachers

An Ed Trust-West study shows that poor/minority students are often assigned the worst teachers, but excel with good instruction.

A new study by Education Trust-West, an education reform advocacy organization, has found that poor, minority children are consistently stuck with the worst-performing teachers.

This comes after a study that shows good teachers from minority backgrounds are beneficial in accelerating academic achievement by Hispanic and black students to levels on par with their white and Asian counterparts.

“We know that great teachers have the power to help students catch up when they’re behind,” said Arun Ramanathan, executive director of The Education Trust-West, who carried out the 18-month-long study, writes Christina Hoag at the Associated Press.

“But you can’t catch up when you don’t have access to the best teachers.”

In the study, 1 million Los Angeles students and 17,000 teachers were analyzed over three years, adding weight to the argument for better evaluation methods of teachers that take into account student achievement.

The study analyzed teachers and student scores from standardized state tests. Researchers found where more effective teachers were located, how many were laid off in 2009, and how students fared under good teachers. This resulted in coming up with rankings for the teachers based on their effectiveness.

And the study found a concentration of more effective teachers in affluent schools and that highly effective teachers who were located in low-performing schools were more likely to leave.

The study found that students who started off behind their class reached levels of academic proficiency after having three consecutive years of top teachers reached levels of academic proficiency. However, the opposite was true if a student drew a weak teacher:

But it also showed that students who had the worst ranked teachers were stuck below grade level.

The study found that seniority-based layoffs – which left more ineffective senior teachers in low performing schools – meant more jobs lost overall.

Since senior teachers are highly paid, more lower-paid teachers had to be cut, notes Hoag.

The study recommends better professional development for teachers and evaluation methods and incentives that help retain top teachers in high-poverty schools.

The study also proposes a reform to state laws that mandate seniority-based layoffs and increased oversight to ensure that top teachers are spread equitably among schools.

Yolie Flores, chief executive of Communities for Teaching Excellence, a school reform organization in Los Angeles, said:

“I found these findings extremely chilling.”

Comments

Guy

January 19, 2012 at 9:03 am

Many struggling schools have very good competent
teachers who do the best we can under difficult situations
which include non supportive administration, attendance issues, hard to reach children, unreasonable demands by parents, and pressure from all directions to pass students and give high grades.
Teachers often leave these schools simply because they become easy targets for poor performance in the classroom as well as the community.
The concept of placing quality teachers in low performing schools has been tried in several systems. In reality it has never worked.
High ranking teachers can certainly have a positive impact. However, improvement is going to require more than simply beating up on teachers. We must have the will to make changes, including some that the community may not like. (Good Luck)

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Joe

January 19, 2012 at 10:15 am

Wouldn’t a better question to answer be why there are anything BUT high-performing teachers in any classrooms at all? Remove them from all classrooms, minority and not, so they can do no damage to anyone.

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- cindy
  
  January 22, 2012 at 7:02 am
  
  Very few teachers are “damaging” the children. Poverty, hunger and lack of intact family damage many. Let’s fight the real problem.
  
  Reply
Angela Engel

January 19, 2012 at 10:48 am

Who’s financing Education Trust West? I’m surprised that the article doesn’t mention that most minority and low-income students have the least experienced teachers, like TFA candidates that turn over every three years.

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- cindy
  
  January 22, 2012 at 6:58 am
  
  Thank you, Angela, for pointing out what should be obvious.
  
  Reply
Kevin

January 19, 2012 at 2:00 pm

Most experienced and accomplished teachers don’t want to work in those schools. The most obvious solution seems to be to offer a sizable financial insentive to good and experienced teachers willing to work in such schools. Why hasn’t this been put into place?

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- Guy
  
  January 20, 2012 at 7:36 am
  
  Hi Kevin
  
  A news paper article appeared in the News and Observer.
  
  About 5 years ago a seriously troubled high school in Charlotte NC released numerous teachers for supposedly poor performance. (some, but not all, did need to be terminated) The idea was to clean house.
  
  A sign on supplement of $10,000 was offered to teachers with a given successful teaching record willing to work for the school.
  
  There were no takers.
  
  Reply
Minority Students Often Placed With Worst Teachers « Uzima Community Blog

January 23, 2012 at 5:12 am

[...] A. Birch reports on the Education News website about the results of an Education-Trust West study that shows that [...]

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J.A

April 13, 2012 at 8:22 am

The real problem is public education itself.

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