The Influence of School Administrators on Teacher Retention Decisions

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Abstract

When given the opportunity, many teachers choose to leave schools serving poor, low-performing, and minority students. While substantial research has documented this phenomenon, far less effort has gone into understanding what features of the working conditions in these schools drive this relatively high turnover rate. This paper explores the relationship between school contextual factors and teacher retention decisions in New York City. The methodological approach separates the effects of teacher characteristics from school characteristics by modeling the relationship between the assessments of school contextual factors by one set of teachers and the turnover decisions by other teachers within the same school. Teachers' perceptions of the school administration have by far the greatest influence on teacher-retention decisions. This effect of administration is consistent for first-year teachers and the full sample of teachers and is confirmed by a survey of teachers who have recently left teaching in New York City.

Introduction

When given the opportunity, many teachers choose to leave schools serving poor, low-performing, and nonwhite students (Boyd et al. 2005; Hanushek, Kain, and Rivkin 2004; Scafidi, Sjoquist, and Stinebrickner 2005). While a substantial research literature has documented this phenomenon, far less research effort has gone into understanding what features of the working conditions in these schools drive this relatively higher turnover rate (see Loeb, Darling-Hammond, and Luczak 2005 for an exception to this). Excessive teacher turnover can be costly and detrimental to instructional cohesion in schools (National Commission on Teaching and America's Future 2003). Consequently, many policies, such as mentoring programs and retention bonuses, have aimed to stem teacher attrition, particularly at schools that experience high teacher turnover. Yet, without a better understanding of the reasons teachers leave, these approaches may not be as effective as they could be.

This study contributes to our understanding of teacher attrition by modeling the relationship between teacher turnover and school contextual factors, including teachers' influence over school policy, the effectiveness of the school administration, staff relations, student behavior, safety, and facilities. Using a unique dataset that combines longitudinal survey data with district administrative files, we find that school administration plays a particularly important role in teachers' career decisions. In what follows, we briefly review relevant prior research to motivate our study, describe our data and methods, and then present the results. The final section discusses the implications of these results, limitations of the study, and directions for future research.

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