Teacher Opportunity Gap, Quality Gap, and Student Achievement Gap in 36 Countries

• In Event: Teacher Education and Teacher Quality: Cross-National Perspectives

Abstract

The global COVID-19 pandemic has severely limited educational access of children in poverty, and teachers in low-SES schools face a challenging task of providing quality education to them and narrowing the widened achievement gap. Using survey and assessment data from nationally representative samples of principals, teachers, and students in 36 countries in OECD 2018 TALIS and PISA, we found that U.S. teachers in low-SES schools reported lower levels of classroom autonomy and satisfaction with their salary, and their self-efficacy and preparedness are lower than their counterparts in high-SES schools. These gaps were higher than most countries. The gap in classroom autonomy was significantly associated with gap in teachers’ self-efficacy, which in turn was associated with achievement gap.

Authors

• Motoko Akiba, Florida State University

• Alexander James Moran, Florida State University

• Kyeongwon Kim, Florida State University