Teacher retention is a topic that, although often studied, continues to display troubling trends in America's public schools. South Carolina is no exception to the trend. Data from recent years indicate overall decreases in teacher retention, especially among the least experienced teachers with 5 or fewer years of classroom experience. Generation…

Recent trends and education research focused on teacher shortages and why teachers were leaving the profession. Music educators and specifically band directors faced heightened stressors because of their jobs. The many hats a high school band director wore included numerous tasks such as organizing, teaching, and coaching innumerable students in…

In this study, we examine teachers' perceptions concerning the relative importance of different administrative supports for teacher retention across school levels (i.e., middle and high schools), retention status (i.e., low or high), and locale (i.e., rural and urban). Results from our Best--Worst Scaling analyses, with a sample of 178 South…

States have increasingly relied on financial policies to address teacher staffing challenges, particularly in high need areas. Case in point, South Carolina developed the Rural Recruitment Initiative (RRI) to provide funding for recruitment and retention efforts in rural and other underserved districts facing severe teacher staffing challenges.…

Rurality is perceived by many to be a deficit or challenge when it comes to teacher recruitment and retention. However, recently, some have argued that moving away from a deficit model and treating rurality as an asset may hold promise for teacher staffing. Drawing on Person-Organization (P-O) fit theory, we extend this argument in our study by…

The vision of every elementary, middle, and high school in the United States is to deliver an excellent educational setting to each and every student who enters their school building. Educational research overwhelmingly demonstrates that a primary factor contributing to an "excellent educational setting" is having highly qualified and…

This article describes the collaborative efforts of various state and national agencies working together to recruit and retain agriculture teachers in the states of Kentucky, South Carolina, and Ohio. We contrast multiple measures of recruitment and retention in these states with those from the comparator states of Arkansas, West Virginia, and…

In this qualitative descriptive case study, I explored the issue of teacher retention, a growing concern within public K-12 education systems in the United States, particularly in South Carolina. I aimed to understand the unique organizational factors within individual school districts that influence retention decisions from the perspectives of…

Alternatively certified teachers constitute a growing portion of public school educators in the U.S. This is a trend that is expected to continue, due to the declining enrollment in traditional teacher preparation programs across recent years. As such, this report examines the profiles of alternatively certified teachers working in South Carolina…

This study aimed to determine whether a correlation exists, either positive or negative, between the concentration of Exemplary followers in a K-12 school with perceived school morale levels and teacher retention. Past research determined the connection between morale and retention. Robert Kelley's research on follower types highlights the…

This study explored the experiences of five Latinx Spanish teachers who worked in schools in rural North Carolina and South Carolina. Using data from 25 semistructured interviews and publicly available school/community demographic information, this qualitative multiple-case study sought to answer the following questions: (a) How do Latinx Spanish…

Background/Context: School districts across the United States face persistent difficulties recruiting and retaining teachers (García & Weiss, 2019; Schmitt & deCourcy, 2022). Over the last decade, every state in the south has faced a growing teacher shortage, with some facing shortages in all grades and subjects (U.S. Department of…

Salaries are one of the most powerful policy levers states and school districts can use to attract qualified, effective, and diverse teachers. What role do states play in supporting strategic use of salaries? This report examines the state teacher compensation policies that influence districts' potential strategic use of teacher pay. It analyzes…

One in 10 public school students in the United States are designated as English learners (ELs), an increase of more than 25 percent over the past 2 decades (National Center for Education Statistics, 2022). In nearly half of states, the proportion of students designated as ELs has more than doubled since 2000. Further, several states--such as…

With more than two decades of on-the-ground experience impacting 300,000 educators and 3 million students, NIET's success is grounded in research. The success of NIET's work is evident in the positive findings from evaluations of impact. In NIET's 2022-23 Research Summary, we summarize findings from five new studies and highlight selected findings…