A Day in the Life: Teachers' Nonschool Time Use

• In Event: 75.035 - Context Matters: Understanding the Multiple Dimensions of Teachers' Lives

Abstract

Teachers are the most important school-provided inputs in the educational process. Accordingly, large literatures have investigated the determinants of effective teaching, teacher turnover, teachers’ preferences for pay and school type, teachers’ use of classroom time and instructional strategies, and so on. However, relatively little is known about how teachers spend time outside the traditional school day, despite the likelihood that work schedules attract individuals to a profession and that out-of-school time use affects teaching effectiveness. The current study fills this gap in the literature by using a nationally representative time-diary survey to describe how teachers spend time outside the traditional work day and how such time compares to that of demographically and socioeconomically similar non-teachers.

Authors

• Seth Gershenson, American University

• Steve Holt, American University

• Kristine L. West, St. Catherine University