School districts are faced with teacher shortages and have turned to alternatively certified and foreign trained teachers to staff classrooms. To increase retention rates of qualified teachers, districts use different methods such as mentoring programs. The purpose of this study was to investigate differences in mentoring experiences and mentoring…

This study describes a benefit-cost analysis of a comprehensive mentoring program for beginning teachers conducted in a medium-sized California school district. Using actual program cost information and data on student achievement, teacher retention, and mentor evaluations, the authors performed a benefit-cost analysis to determine whether…

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Texas will need over 82,000 new teachers by 2008. Many teachers are leaving the profession within 5 years of being employed. Closing a revolving door, teacher preparation programs are discussing this phenomenon. One hundred sixty beginning teacher candidates were surveyed using the Emotional Skills…

Ensuring a qualified teacher in every classroom is a central part of the latest agenda to strengthen public education and maximize student achievement. Effective teaching and delivering quality instruction are lifelong and critical goals of professional development of teachers. High-quality induction programs support qualified teachers for every…

Mentoring has become an extremely popular policy for improving the retention and performance of new teachers, but we know little about its effects on teacher and student outcomes. I study the impact of mentoring in New York City, which adopted a nationally recognized mentoring program in 2004. I use detailed program data to examine the…

In 2002, when the authors began their three-year study of the problems new teachers face ("Supporting Beginning English Teachers"), No Child Left Behind (NCLB) had yet to have a significant impact on the lives of most classroom teachers. When they were interviewing beginning teachers, they had no idea that Jonathan Kozol was also in the…

Although teaching for social justice is a widely recognized goal of many teacher education programs, there are few supports for new teachers who wish to continue this kind of practice. In this article, I discuss the ways that a group of four new teachers found flexible support for developing a vision of teaching for social justice through…

Given calls to diversify the teaching workforce, this review examines research on retention and turnover of teachers of color, focusing on new teachers because they leave at disproportionately high rates. Reviewing 70 studies, the authors found that (a) recent national studies identify turnover rates for teachers of color are now higher than those…

This report describes findings from the principal focus group conducted the first year of the AISD REACH program. [For Report 2, see ED628033.]

The educational problem that schools face is the loss of new teachers that leave the field of education with in the first five years of teaching (Hope, 1999; Darling-Hammond, 2003). Teachers have cited many reasons for leaving the classroom such as lack of administrative support, lack of classroom management strategies, difficulties…

This report summarizes the results from new teacher surveys conducted in the Austin Independent School District during spring 2007. New teachers were asked about activities and support provided by their mentor teachers, their level of implementation of instructional practices, and their professional development needs.

Teachers join the profession hoping to inspire students, but their training does not fully prepare them for the realities of the classroom. What is more, the lifelines administrators provide to new hires are not always reliable. Most veteran teachers mandated by state or local officials to serve as mentors are not given time or money to provide…

This study examines principal monitoring and beginning teachers' experiences through interviews. Findings indicate socializing into an ineffective school will either promulgate ineffective practices or will produce an internal conflict. At schools where principals were "all about the kids," teachers demonstrated loyalty and voiced intentions to…

The views of 46 mentors of first-year teachers were obtained regarding practices that they viewed as essential for their success in mentoring teachers. Specifically, they were queried about teacher involvement/support, staff development, administrative support, and resource materials. Almost all of the mentor teachers believed a teacher-mentoring…

In Fall 2009 and Spring 2010, 30 teaching residency programs received funding through one of 28 Teacher Quality partnership grants awarded to establish or expand residency programs. These programs follow a model of teacher preparation in which prospective teachers complete graduate-level coursework alongside a year-long fieldwork experience in the…