Insights for Action Research Summary: Teacher Labor Market Trends Over Time: Recruitment, Hiring Processes, Shortages

Over the past decade, TERA has tackled some of Tennessee’s most pressing educational challenges. We’ve examined teacher retention and pipeline development, investigated principal and leadership effectiveness, explored strategic staffing, supported early-career educators, and analyzed the drivers of student learning and well-being. Our research has illuminated pathways to postsecondary readiness and shaped how educational leaders think about their work.

Over the next few months, we’re recapping our research, the insights that have emerged, and how evidence-driven collaboration continues to reshape educational policy and practice in our state. We’re excited to share this milestone, as we reflect on a decade of rigorous research and why this work matters.

• Key Insight #1: Young people today are less interested in teaching than previous generations. Alternative entry pathways into teaching are emerging as a solution to draw more individuals into teaching outside of traditional bachelor’s degree teacher preparation programs.
• Key Insight #2: Teachers choose to work in schools for a variety of reasons, both personal and job-related. More experienced teachers who switch schools are often seeking a better fit, while early career teachers typically make decisions with respect to geography and personal networks.
• Key Insight #3: Teachers working in hard-to-staff, low-performing schools highly value consistent discipline enforcement and administrative support. These malleable factors are more important to these teachers’ decision to work in a school than other characteristics, such as student demographics or prior achievement, and are on par with salary considerations.
• Key Insight #4: School principals are heavily involved in the hiring process but are less involved in recruitment. Few teachers report participating in performance-based tasks as part of the hiring process.
• Key Insight #5: Teacher staffing challenges are highly localized and specific to certain job categories. Districts with many teachers may still struggle to hire for individual schools or subject areas, and these challenges have become more severe in recent years.