390 R.P. Strauss et al. Economics of Education Review 19 2000 387–415
decisions on the basis of no more than an hour of con- sideration.
The purpose of this paper is: 1. to provide a variety of facts about public school
teacher preparation in Pennsylvania and around the US which are not well known, and will be of general
interest; and, 2. to interpret these facts in relation to the public policy
design problem of creating incentives which will pro- mote high learning standards.
The data on the matters of the nature of teacher prep- aration and certification and selection decisions in
Pennsylvania are compelling. They raise serious ques- tions about whether local control as currently construed,
the mantra of public education in the US, is capable of doing any more than ensure mediocrity. When one looks
closely at who gets hired, how they get hired and retained, to teach in our public school classrooms, much
of the mystery and confusion about mediocre student performance disappears. How one changes this, how-
ever, is not easy, and will likely be controversial.
1.2. Organization of paper The paper is organized as follows:
Section 2 outlines the major features of the market for classroom teachers in Pennsylvania.
Section 3 explores the quality of teachers prepared in Pennsylvania teacher preparation institutions and the sel-
ectivity of school districts in their hiring practices as reflected in the content knowledge scores achieved by
prospective and employed teachers;
Section 4 reports the results of an extensive survey of Pennsylvania school district employment practices, cor-
relations across districts between differing personnel practices and average student achievement in mathemat-
ics and reading in 1996, and some econometric estimates of an exploratory model of who gets hired and the effects
on student achievement.
Section 5 summarizes the stylized facts and their implications for educational policy, vis a` vis teacher
preparation standards, program approval, and the stan- dardization of employment practices by local school
boards.
2. The market for classroom teachers in Pennsylvania and their preparation
Pennsylvania’s 501 school districts currently enroll about 1.8 million students; they have employed about
100,000 classroom teachers annually for the last 15 years; overall there are about 130,000 professional per-
sonnel in the public education system. In the 1990s, between 3,700 to 6,300 teachers were hired annually;
new hires have increasingly come from the experienced teacher force. In 1984 54 of newly hired teachers had
prior experience; in 1996 68 of newly hired teachers had prior teaching experience in Pennsylvania. In 1996
only 1,285 newly hired teachers had no prior teaching experience. Somewhere between 4,000 and 6,000 teach-
ers, administrators and coordinators have been annually hired by all of Pennsylvania’s local districts and inter-
mediate units. In 1993 a temporary early retirement win- dow was opened by the Pennsylvania General Assembly.
About 10,000 teachers, administrators and coordinators retired, and about 8,000 new hires took place. Hires of
inexperienced classroom teachers have been on the order of no more than 2,000 per year, and in the last two years,
that number has dropped to no more than 1,200.
Like teachers in other industrialized states, Pennsyl- vania’s teachers are getting closer to retirement: the
median age was 45 and the median years of professional experience was 19 years; 25 of Pennsylvania’s class-
room teachers had 26 or more years of experience.
2.1. Supply of teaching certificates from Pennsylvania colleges and universities
Pennsylvania trains far more teachers than it hires. Pennsylvania currently has better than 90 teacher prep-
aration institutions including 14 state supported insti- tutions which were originally two year normal schools.
In the past several years, Pennsylvania certificating insti- tutions have issued better than 20,000 certificates per
year of various kinds. Compared to the 1980s, the pro- duction of various teaching and administrative certifi-
cates is accelerating. It follows, of course, that the vast bulk of newly trained teachers each year are unable to
obtain teaching positions in Pennsylvania. Table 1 dis- plays the astounding production of teaching certificates
by broad certification area over 5 year intervals.
7
2.2. Supply and demand through school year 2005 Demographic analysis of student enrollment by school
district, grade and course through 2005, and demo- graphic analysis of possible teacher retirement scenarios
by school district and course through 2005 indicate a wide range of teacher replacement needs.
8
Table 2 indi- cates by broad certification area the ratio of hiring needs,
under three retirement assumptions and historical quits,
7
Note that the Total column includes certificates issued before 1966. Also, departmental records before the mid-1960s
were not computerized.
8
See Strauss 1993, Chapter 3 for the development of the simulation models and methodology.
391 R.P.
Strauss et
al. Economics
of Education
Review 19
2000 387–415
Table 1 Education certificates by broad area across time
a
Certification area 66–70
71–5 76–80
81–85 96–90
91–95 96–97
Total Administrativesupervisory
1,476 3,444
5,214 5,009
4,753 4898
2,147 28,202
Agriculture 17
42 59
64 32
31 14
286 Art
1,508 3,095
2,617 1,279
1,038 1,786
708 12,452
Biology 841
1,409 938
667 901
1,120 554
6,611 Business education
1,238 1,718
1,312 913
772 860
344 7,658
Chemistry 238
537 355
289 387
529 298
2,675 Coordinate services
3,387 8,113
6,824 3,820
4,186 6,588
3,011 36,619
Driver education 346
926 781
343 232
279 85
3,133 Early childhood
320 1,382
3,260 3,080
3,304 6,438
2,428 20,492
Earthspace 178
446 300
148 180
292 113
1,678 English
5,258 8,384
4,818 2,750
2,714 4,865
1,929 31,596
French 1,015
1,560 679
385 330
477 205
4,912 General elementary
17,374 31,512
20,020 11,432
13,892 28,316
11,017 138,934
General science 1,580
1,900 1,215
995 975
1,569 679
9,556 German
317 577
333 189
134 217
86 1,931
Gifted 2
3 6
Healthphys education 2,097
5,275 4,348
2,951 1,754
2,660 1,106
20,517 Hearing impaired
68 205
380 344
267 308
158 1,747
Home economics 1,297
2,094 1,499
659 364
333 166
6,801 Industrial arts
554 1,154
1,133 795
458 493
230 5,045
Mathematics 2,572
4,419 2,469
1,580 2,565
4,087 1,552
19,684 Mentalphys handi
1,780 4,214
6,266 5,543
4,542 6,586
3,260 32,536
Music 1,568
3,244 3,415
2,074 1,604
2,287 818
15,310 Not listed elsewhere
588 2,633
5,423 3,817
5,304 7,327
1,652 26,829
Other handicapped 139
864 1,255
251 91
64 17
2,684 Other languages
271 287
173 120
135 175
69 1,369
Other science 143
52 19
31 14
3 507
Physics 243
490 302
169 225
512 230
2,219 Reading specialists
411 2,106
4,035 2,743
2,145 2,856
1,085 15,417
Social studies 5,964
9,841 4,818
2,607 2,842
4,982 1,895
35,346 Spanish
961 1,747
997 550
551 1,007
515 6,550
Speechlang impaired 511
1,385 1,980
1,302 814
853 343
7,300 Visually impaired
55 151
228 157
134 291
119 1,145
Vocational education 1,045
1,253 1,844
1,198 870
1,101 516
8,006 Vocational health
86 46
84 27
34 61
36 381
Vocational tech educt 61
78 69
51 50
53 27
392 Total
55,509 106,586
89,462 58,332
58,593 94,304
37,412 516,526
a
Source: Authors’ analysis of Pennsylvania Professional Personnel and Certification files.
R.P. Strauss
et al.
Economics of
Education
Review 19
2000 387–415
Table 2 Pennsylvania classroom teacher hiring needs: 1997–2005 as percentage of 19967 employed classroom teachers
a
Model 1 Model 2
Model 3 Model 1
Model Model 3
Total predicted demand as of 19967 1997–05
1997–05 1997–05
teachers Certification area
967 Quits
Age 65 30 yrs
Age 55 and Quits Age 65
+ 30 yrs
+ 55 and 27
+ Model 1
Model 2 Model 3
teachers ann.
retires exper.
27 yrs exp 1997–05 quits
quits quits
Rep Age Rep 30
Rep Avg
Retires retires
65 yrs
55 +
27 2
3 4
5 6
7 8
9 10
11 12
13 Agriculture
162 8
13 58
52 72
85 130
124 53
80 77
Art 1,532
46 121
778 688
414 535
1,192 1,102
35 78
72 Biology
1,858 32
330 1,084
1,026 288
618 1372
1,314 33
74 71
Business education 1,926
42 385
1,182 1,119
378 763
1,560 1,497
40 81
78 Chemistry
967 24
168 522
491 216
384 738
707 40
76 73
Driver education 226
3 43
171 161
27 70
198 188
31 88
83 Early childhood
1,385 26
100 184
121 234
134 418
355 10
30 26
Earthspace 612
11 81
386 334
99 180
485 433
29 79
71 English
6,662 102
1,122 4,106
3,860 918
2,040 5,024
4,778 31
75 72
French 786
19 123
462 442
171 294
633 613
37 81
78 General elementary
39,787 559
1,388 13,826
11,559 5,031
3,643 18,857
16,590 9
47 42
General science 2,027
38 325
1,197 1,143
342 667
1,539 1,485
33 76
73 German
402 10
69 239
229 90
159 329
319 40
82 79
Gifted 586
7 36
306 289
63 99
369 352
17 63
60 Healthphys education
3,123 73
325 1,823
1,567 657
982 2,480
2,224 31
79 71
Home economics 1,652
30 316
877 775
270 586
1,147 1,045
36 69
63 Industrial arts
1,939 34
281 1,192
1,042 506
587 1,498
1,348 30
77 70
Mathematics 6,067
94 906
3,653 3,380
846 1,752
4,499 4,226
29 74
70 Music
1,834 97
117 728
594 873
990 1,601
1,467 54
87 80
Other languages 178
5 40
93 87
45 85
138 132
48 78
74 Other science
28 3
15 14
3 15
14 11
54 50
Physics 544
12 93
280 267
108 201
388 375
37 71
69 Social studies
5,782 66
1,061 3,804
3,627 594
1,655 4,398
4,221 29
76 73
Spanish 1,559
28 238
714 691
252 490
966 943
31 62
61 Vocational educat
532 22
130 241
262 198
328 439
460 62
83 87
Vocational health 30
1 11
8 15
9 20
17 24
67 57
80 Vocational tech
6 5
26 115
99 45
71 160
144 31
71 64
Total 82,412
1,394 4,875
38.044 33.934
12 546 17,421
50.59 46.48
21 61
56
a
Source: Pennsylvania Teacher Demographic Simulation Model
393 R.P. Strauss et al. Economics of Education Review 19 2000 387–415
in relation to the number of employed classroom teachers in 19967.
Three different retirement assumptions are enter- tained: 1 teachers will retire at age 65; 2 teachers will
retire upon reaching 30 years of service; or 3 teachers will retire when they have achieved 27 years of service
and age 55 the incentives in place in 1993.
Columns 8, 9, and 10 of Table 2 show the projected accumulated retirements and voluntary quits between
1997 and 2005 under the three retirement assumptions. Each projection also takes into account changing student
demographics and course enrollments. Columns 11, 12, and 13 show the projected turnover rate, or the percent-
age of the currently employed teachers Column 2 who will be replaced between now and school year 2005.
This analysis indicates:
1. The net number of elementary teachers will decline
