A Housing Crisis for Teachers: What District Leaders Can Learn From Affordable Housing Initiatives for Educators

• In Event: Critical Intersections Among Housing and Education: Understanding Relationships, and Exploring New Opportunities, Across Policy Spheres

Abstract

This paper provides an overview and typology of housing initiatives for teachers across the county and its impact on efforts to strengthen teacher recruitment and retention. The paper also explores the design and implementation of two affordable housing initiatives for teachers in the state of Colorado, including one in a changing urban district and one in a rural community. According to a national study on housing affordability for teachers in 2017, which reviewed teacher salary data in 124 large districts and compared them to median costs for rental and homeownership, only 20 percent of teachers with five years of experience can comfortably afford monthly costs associated with median-priced homes (National Council on Teacher Quality, 2017). Indeed, in more than 50 cities in the country, including Boston, Chicago, Denver, Miami, Nashville and Seattle, the median cost of rent for a one bedroom apartment was equivalent to 30% or less of a teachers’ salary (Fay, 2017; Loewus, 2017).

Lack of affordable housing coincides with national concerns about teacher satisfaction and retention. In the Spring of 2018, massive teacher protests unfolded across the country, including statewide walkouts and teacher strikes in large cities. While protests garnered considerable attention about the crisis of low teacher pay and inadequate school funding, long-term strategies to mitigate teacher shortage and attrition garnered less attention, including substantive changes to funding structures or the need for new creative compensation structures. One component of creative compensation structures for recruiting and retaining teachers of late is affordable housing. Little is known, however, about the variety, implementation and impact of affordable housing initiatives for teachers in the country. Although understudied, research notes that nearly 25% of teachers who left their school or district in 2012-13 listed housing incentives as an important factor that would shape their decision to return to their school or district (Podolsky, Kini, Bishop & Darling-Hammond, 2016).

As such, this study provides an overview of state and district housing initiatives for teachers in the country, offering a typology of initiatives with various points of emphasis, including those that offer housing incentives or stipends for rent, relocation, down payment assistance, as well as initiatives the focus on the development of discounted homes or subsidized teacher housing. In districts with robust initiatives, lasting five years or more, the study includes a review of teacher turnover data. To supplement national trends in housing initiatives, qualitative interviews with 10 state and district leaders, as well as 15 teacher participants in two of Colorado’s housing initiatives are also provided as an in-depth look into specific design and implementation issues at the local level.

The significance of the study is its emphasis on policies not typically associated with teacher workforce initiatives. Moreover, while large districts have deployed market mechanisms to attract competitive teachers or to incentivize current teachers, such as various forms of merit pay, these efforts often shift attention away from broader economic constraints that shape teachers’ decisions to not only leave schools but the regions in which schools are located.

Authors

• Terrenda Corisa White, University of Colorado-Boulder

• Jackquelin Bristol, University of Colorado - Boulder