The Effects of a Teacher Licensure Policy Change on Special Education Teachers’ Caseloads

• In Event: Staffing for Special Education Service Delivery and Impacts of SPED Service Delivery Models

Abstract

Motivation and Context

In 2020, Indiana issued more than 1,200 emergency teaching licenses in Special Education. These one-year licenses allowed individuals without traditional training and who had not passed required exams to teach. However, in 2021, Indiana discontinued emergency licensure for SETs, mandating that all special education teachers (SETs) meet full licensure standards.

While some argue this policy helps to ensure SET quality, others worry about the consequences for schools who had previously relied on emergency licensed teachers to fill vacancies. If the policy change reduces the number of SETs working in the state, it could increase SETs’ caseloads (WFYI, 2021). Given literature suggesting that larger and more challenging caseloads are associated with decreased SET effectiveness and satisfaction, this scenario is worrisome (Bettini et al., 2016; Bettini et al., 2019).

Many states began offering emergency licenses to address pandemic-era vacancies but are now considering reversing those policies and need insights about potential implications. We study the effect of this policy change on SETs and add to the literature about how similar policy changes may have unintended consequences that impact teachers’ working conditions.

Approach and Research Questions

Using longitudinal administrative data on all students and teachers in Indiana from 2012 to 2024, we describe the SET workforce and capture the impact of the policy change on caseloads. We ask three research questions: First, how are emergency licensed SETs distributed across schools? Second, how did the SET workforce change after the policy was implemented? And last, what was the impact of the policy change on SETs’ caseloads?

We answer the first question by describing relationships between school-level characteristics (student demographics and locale) and the school-level proportion of SETs working on emergency licenses.

To answer the second question, we describe the demographic characteristics of SETs and counts of SETs working on emergency licenses before and after the policy change. We do not expect to observe SETs working on emergency licenses after 2021.

To answer the third research question, we use a difference-in-differences model. We compare the caseloads of non-emergency licensed SETs working in schools that employed large proportions of emergency SETs pre-policy change to non-emergency licensed SETs working in schools that did not employ large proportions of emergency SETs (and thus who would not be as affected by the policy change). We model the outcomes (caseload size and the student disabilities represented in their caseloads) as a function of a binary Treat variable (equal to 1 for teachers in schools that employed more emergency licensed SETs pre-2021, and 0 otherwise) and a binary variable Post for the observations occurring within the post period. The Post*Treat interaction yields the causal estimate.

Preliminary Results 

Preliminary analyses suggest that schools serving higher proportions of economically disadvantaged students employ larger proportions of emergency licensed SETs.

Author

• Hannah Kistler, University at Albany
  Presenting Author