This article reflects on the Kentucky Teacher Internship Program, a program that provides first-year early childhood educators support and assistance from a team of resource teachers, principals, and teacher educators through a year-long supervised internship. It discusses teacher attrition and the need to address issues of teachers' pay and…

Data from two panel studies, the 1993 to 1995 nationwide Schools and Staffing Survey and the Teacher Follow-Up Survey, as well as a 1998-1999 survey of teachers in one western state are used to examine the influence of variables related to demographic characteristics, work assignment, effectiveness, social support, and school management on the…

Scarcity has been such a constant in education for so long that self-sufficient teachers routinely purchase classroom supplies at their own expense. Sometimes desperate measures are needed to obtain even the most basic equipment. But beyond the lack of material resources are more serious conditions that create an atmosphere of famine, turning…

This paper reviews the research literature on new teacher mentoring, focusing on issues of definition, why teachers quit, and the effects of mentoring on retention. Conclusions call for more scientific studies on the relationship between mentoring and retention, more research on the relation between mentoring and other educational outcomes, and a…

Many schools across the country face persistent teacher working condition challenges that are closely related to high teacher turnover rates and chronic difficulties in recruiting and retaining teachers. Center for Teaching Quality (CTQ) research examining working conditions survey results in both North Carolina and South Carolina demonstrates…

Findings of a study that examined teachers' personal reasons for resigning are presented in this paper, which develops a model of teacher persistence. Interviews were conducted with 57 teachers who resigned from primary schools, and various regional and Head Office positions with the New Wales (Australia) Department of School Education during the…

Two recent studies imply that there is a negative selection process at work which systematically attracts and then holds in the teaching profession young people with modest verbal and quantitative abilities. The Vance & Schlecty study compared "recruits"--those who had: (1) majored in education; (2) taught school; or (3) obtained a certificate to…

In response to education reform mandates, rewards and incentives such as career ladder and master teacher programs are being designed to break lock-step salary schedules and to retain competent teachers. While these "pay-for-performance" plans seem acceptable to taxpayers, few realize that such approaches have already been tried and…

Prospective teachers must face numerous pressures and difficulties during their training and subsequent negative factors in their lives as professionals. Among the conditions that exist for the prospective teacher, economic constraints play an important role. Pressures also exist during student teaching, when students must attempt to please both a…

The growing incidence of teacher burnout suggests that many teachers have difficulty in satisfying their needs and in deriving satisfaction from teaching. This study examined the needs that teachers appear to have difficulty in satisfying. The study is based on Herzberg's Hygiene-Motivation Theory. This theory, related to Maslow's Hierarchy of…

The purpose of this follow up study to "Principal Behaviors That Encourage Teachers to Stay in the Profession: Perceptions of K-8 Teachers in Their 2nd to 5th Year of Teaching" (Richards, 2002) was to compare the perceptions of K-8 teachers at three career stages on the principal behaviors that encourage them most: (1) 1-5 years of…

Contemporary educational thought holds that one of the pivotal causes of inadequate school performance is the inability of schools to adequately staff classrooms with qualified teachers. It is widely believed that schools are plagued by shortages of teachers, primarily due to recent increases in teacher retirements and student enrollments. This…

In discussing Donna Kerr's recommendations for improving teaching through better preservice training (Teachers College Record, Spring 1983), Sykes points out the need to enhance the quality of a teacher's work life in the schools as a requisite for reform. Specific changes at the school level are suggested. (PP)

Summarizes suggestions from child care directors concerning recruitment and retention of high quality staff. (BB)

The proposition that teacher perceptions of the fairness of their workloads are related to varying levels of commitment, job satisfaction, and morale was studied for 472 high school teachers. Results from the mail survey support the proposition. Implications for administrative practice are discussed. (SLD)