Increased Supports for New Teachers

Have No Additional Effect on Student Achievement, Teacher Retention After Two Years

Less Intensive Induction Programs Just as Effective, Mathematica Study Finds

Results from a study on programs offering in-depth support, known as comprehensive teacher induction, for new teachers suggest that in the first two years these programs have no additional effect on improving teacher retention or student achievement when compared to the services normally offered in the 17 districts participating in the study.

The study, conducted by Mathematica Policy Research, finds that teachers who were offered one or two years of comprehensive induction support were more likely to have a mentor and spent more time with a mentor than were teachers in a randomly assigned control group who received the prevailing induction offered by the district, which was less comprehensive and intensive. However, the increased resources did not lead to measurable improvements in student test scores, percentage of teachers remaining in their district or in the profession, or in qualifications of the teachers who were retained.

Teacher induction programs—those designed to support new teachers and reduce teacher turnover—are common in most schools across the country. Comprehensive teacher induction, however, goes beyond traditional teacher induction by relying on carefully selected and trained full-time mentors. Comprehensive induction also includes an intensive curriculum involving instructional support and professional development, opportunities to observe experienced teachers, and assessment tools for teachers that permit ongoing evaluation of practice and constructive feedback.

“While the study is continuing to collect and analyze longer-term follow-up data, we have yet to find that more comprehensive induction is having a significant impact in the areas we expected,” said Amy Johnson, director of the study and a senior vice president at Mathematica. “The findings held whether we looked at one year or two years of intervention.”

The study involved 1,009 teachers in 418 elementary schools in 17 medium and large urban school districts in 13 states. Researchers implemented induction programs provided by Educational Testing Service of Princeton, N.J., and the New Teacher Center at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Researchers selected the service providers based on a formal competition judged by an independent panel of experts in the field. WestEd, a national nonprofit research and service agency, monitored the fidelity of program implementation.

The study design used random assignment to form a group of teachers exposed to the more intensive and comprehensive teacher induction (treatment) and an equivalent group exposed to the district’s prevailing set of induction services (control). The design enabled researchers to compare outcomes for these two groups and measure impacts of the more intensive supports. The treatment groups in 9 districts were offered one year of comprehensive services. The treatment groups in the remaining 8 districts were offered two years of such services. Researchers used surveys and school records to measure teachers’ backgrounds; receipt of induction services and alternative support services; attitudes; and outcomes related to classroom practices, student achievement, and teacher retention.

The report is entitled “Impacts of Comprehensive Teacher Induction: Results from the Second Year of a Randomized Controlled Study.”

To read more about the research.

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