The more charter schools, the worse the shortage of teachers prepared in university education programs. Those in university programs intend to be career educators, and their numbers are shrinking. Thus concludes a new study from a federal research center created to study choice and its effects.
When Betsy DeVos was Secretary of Education, she awarded $10 million to create the National Center for Research on Education Access and Choice (REACH). The research group is headed by Douglas Harris, and DeVos assumed that he was pro-choice.
While Harris has written papers favorable to choice, he is an independent scholar and follows the data where it leads. In this paper, he and his co-author Mary Penn conclude that charter schools contribute to the teacher shortage.
On its face, the proposition makes sense. If a young person wants to teach, they can get a job in a charter school without a teacher education degree. They can join Teach for America and become a teacher with only weeks of preparation. Or in some states, they can teach with no certification or degrees. Why bother going through the process of professional education and certification when charter schools will hire without any prerequisites?
The summary of the study concludes:
Debates about charter schools center on their immediate effects on students who attend them and how charter schools affect nearby traditional public schools. However, as the charter sector has continued to grow, a broader range of possibly unintended effects become relevant. This study is one of the first to examine the possibility that
charter schools affect the teacher pipeline. We focus specifically on how charter schools affect the number of traditionally prepared teachers who receive a bachelor’s in education.
Using data from 290 school districts with at least one commuter college nearby, we analyze the effect on the traditional teacher pipeline from schools of education. We draw the following conclusions:
Increasing district charter school enrollment by 10% decreases the supply of teachers traditionally prepared with a bachelor’s in education by 13.5-15.2% on average.
Charter-driven reductions in the supply of traditionally prepared teachers are most apparent in elementary, special education, and math education degrees.
This is consistent with the fact that charter schools mostly serve elementary grades, express interest in subject matter experts (e.g., math majors), and are less likely to assign students to special education.
These charter-driven reductions are concentrated in metropolitan areas and are largest among Black teachers.
Given how central teachers are to the educational process, any effect on the teacher pipeline is important. The vast majority of U.S. teachers still come from university-based schools of education, and these teachers stay in the profession longer than those who are not traditionally prepared, which makes these declines note worthy. A larger
point is that charter schools change the entire schooling market in ways we are only beginning to recognize.
The National Education Policy Center reviewed the study here.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I attended college in the late 1960s. I can still recall my working class dad encouraging me to become a teacher. He said, “It’s a stable career for a woman.” Although his comment still makes me cringe a little, I understand his reasoning. My dad grew up poor, and his own career in manufacturing where he worked like a dog was notoriously unstable through no fault of his own. I followed his advice because I enjoyed learning, and the idea of contributing to the development of young minds appealed to me. Also, the possibility of some degree of stability was attractive as well. Overall, it work out for me, and I loved my students and the work.
So-called reform has undermined the attractiveness of becoming a career teacher. A career teacher is not a lazy, self-serving civil servant as deformers claim, and I have known many outstanding career teachers during my career. A career educator is generally a dedicated professional that prepares for instruction and cares about the students.
Public school teachers have been a scapegoat for deformers that want to privatize education and turn it into a commodity. Notoriously unstable charter schools are market based schools with lax job requirements that cheapen the profession. We cannot attract quality young people to the teaching profession unless we make it more attractive to them. Deformers have also placed their administrative trolls in public urban districts where they spread a toxic atmosphere of mistrust and instability in the public schools as well. We cannot young people to pursue a low paying, low value, unstable career after making so much personal investment to gain legitimate teaching credentials.
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cx: We cannot entice young people to pursue a low paying, low value, unstable career….
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and in days when the word “career” seems to be more and more a fading reality
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Workers that are treated respectfully and feel they have a say in the workplace are more likely to stay and create a more positive, stable environment for students. Change is part of life, but chronic disruption is harmful to both students and teachers.
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In too many states, substitute K-12 teachers are required to have least a high school GED.
There are too many states (I counted 24 on the list) that don’t require certification or college courses. Instead, these states require individuals to have their high school diploma or GED. They also run background checks. Other than that, they don’t require much more. Why? Because many of these states struggle to find substitute teachers. Of course, you may be able to make more money if you have your bachelor’s degree and teaching certificate. These states include:
https://magoosh.com/praxis/states-require-substitute-teacher-certification/
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I don’t think that the loss of professional teachers is an unintended consequence of charters. I think that was the point all along. Deprofessronalize teaching and make it a cheap and transitory job. Keep the tax dollars flowing to corporate profits and keep everyone undereducated in the process
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If you listen to some in the media, they never mention deform as a cause. They are more likely to blame salary and working conditions as the cause.
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We have a winner.
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As is said in New Orleans, “Yeah, you right!”
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Last time I checked charter school teacher turnover, it was much higher than in traditional public schools. Most charters did not provide health care etc. Teachers also were hired on a ‘at will’ basis and could be fired for no reason. I wonder if that is still true? If so, the real issue is that the teaching profession is just not attracting career oriented people. Here, many people teach for a few years while a partner is in school etc.
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