Will They Stay or Will They Go? Using Organizational Theory to Examine Policy Effects on New Teacher Turnover

Thomas Max Smith

My project will apply organizational theory to better understand policy effects on turnover among beginning teachers. The study will use the nationally and state representative Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) and its longitudinal component the Teacher Follow-up Survey (TFS) to examine why new teachers quit their positions at such high rates. Specifically, the project will focus on how (a) pre-service socialization, including pedagogical coursework and the number of weeks of practice teaching, (b) socialization during the first year of teaching, including participation in induction/mentorship programs and collaborative planning with other teachers, and (c) administrative support, including principals’ buffering of non-instructional activities, are related to the likelihood that a teacher will leave teaching or change schools at the end of their first year of teaching. I will also examine whether different types of support for first year teachers attenuate a “socialization gap” that may exist between teachers receiving different types of pre-service education and experience. Finally, I will examine the extent to which state-level regulations regarding teacher hiring and state-level curriculum and accountability policies explain between-state variation in the likelihood of turnover among beginning teachers.

About Thomas Max Smith

Dr. Thomas Smith is Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Education at Peabody, Vanderbilt University. Prior to coming to Vanderbilt in 2001, Prof. Smith accumulated considerable experience in both the federal and international education research community. Between 1991 and 2001, he conducted and managed statistical research activities at the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and, the National Science Foundation (NSF). Much of his work in these organizations focused on the development of indicators for education policy making: co-authoring six editions of NCES's annual report to Congress, The Condition of Education, three editions of OECD's comparative indicators report Education at a Glance, and the chapter on K-12 mathematics and science education in the National Science Board's 2002 edition of Science and Engineering Indicators. Prof. Smith's current research agenda focuses on cross-school variability in the incentives for teachers to participate in mentorship and professional development activities; the relationship between pre-service education and mentorship on new teacher turnover; the relationship between teacher credentials, content knowledge, participation in professional development activities, and teaching quality; and organizational predictors of cross-national variability in teachers’ instructional practice. He received his doctorate from the Pennsylvania State University in 2000.