The Effects of a Job-Embedded Professional Development on Teachers' Self-Efficacy and Student Achievement

• In Event: Roundtable Session 1
  In Roundtable Session: Designing and Implementing STEM-Focused Professional Development

Abstract

This study used a quantitative approach to investigate the impact of a district-wide, job-embedded mathematics professional development program on elementary teachers’ general and personal efficacy.

The investigation of the professional development work was based on the principles of effective mathematics professional development, efficacy theory, and student achievement.

Teachers’ general and personal efficacy was measured using a paired-samples t test.
Student achievement was regressed over the measures of teachers’ general efficacy, teachers’ personal efficacy, and socioeconomic status (lunch status).

The results indicate that a relationship existed between teachers’ general efficacy and student socioeconomic status predicted student achievement in mathematics. The researcher concluded that job-embedded, sustained professional development leads to improved student achievement in mathematics when it is job-embedded.

Authors

• Krista Althauser, Eastern Kentucky University

• James S. Rinehart, Eastern Kentucky University