Career Mobility and Departure Behaviors of School Principals in the United States

• In Event: Roundtable Session 18.
  In Roundtable Session: The Roles, Career Paths, and Behaviors of Educational Leaders

Abstract

Despite concerns about turnover among administrators, conditions that influence career departure and mobility behaviors of school principals are less known. To address this gap in the literature, we conducted a series of logistic regressions to understand individual, school and district characteristics impacting principals’ career departure and mobility behaviors, using SASS data. Our findings indicate that job satisfaction, salary, district teacher incentive policies, unionization policies, and the school’s AYP status, impact principals’ departure and mobility behaviors. Further, characteristics that impact departure and mobility behaviors are, in part, separate, suggesting that different sets of policy levers may be needed to increase retention. Our next phase of analysis will use HGLM to untangle the influence of policy malleable factors on principal retention.

Authors

• Abebayehu Aemero Tekleselassie, The George Washington University

• Jaehwa Choi, The George Washington University

• Felisa Gonzales, The George Washington University