Revisiting Teacher Quality Gaps: Geographic Disparities in Access to Highly Effective Teachers Across Tennessee

• In Event: Issues in Teacher Knowledge, Testing, and Licensure

Abstract

There are continued concerns over the inequitable distribution of highly effective teachers among disadvantaged student populations. Using statewide data from Tennessee from 2007-2015 academic years, this study aims to assess whether students of marginalized socio-demographic backgrounds have unequal exposure to highly effective teachers. We document substantive disparities in exposure to teachers considered the highest performing based on test-based measures of teacher effectiveness. On average, traditionally disadvantaged students are 5 percentage points less likely to be exposed to an effective teacher than all other students. We also show the differential exposure to highly effective teachers across student racial and socioeconomic subgroups are a byproduct of an unequal distribution of teacher effectiveness within school contexts as opposed to across schools.

Authors

• Luis Alberto Rodriguez, New York University

• Tuan D Nguyen, Kansas State University

• Matthew G. Springer, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill