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School Hiring Practices in Urban Districts Discourage Best-Qualified Teachers from Working Where They Are Needed Most

Districts Losing Teachers With High GPAs, Degrees in Teaching Field,
And Strong Interest in Working In Urban Classrooms and High-Need Areas

WASHINGTON – September 15, 2003 – Despite receiving hundreds, if not thousands of applications to fill their teacher vacancies, most urban school districts are losing many of the best-qualified teachers because of slow hiring practices, delays in state budget timetables, and teachers union seniority rules. As a result, urban districts scramble to fill vacancies with lesser-qualified teachers, according to a new report that analyzes the hiring processes of four representative urban school districts in the United States.

Through targeted, high-impact recruitment strategies, all four districts studied received many times more applications than they had teaching vacancies. One district received 20 times more applications for positions while the others had up to six times as many applications as they had available positions. Up to 37 percent of the candidates applied to teach in high-need areas such as math, science, special education and bilingual education. Nonetheless, because each district failed to make job offers until mid-to-late summer, between 31 to almost 60 percent of applicants had already withdrawn from the hiring process – many to take jobs in suburban districts that made earlier offers.

The report, Missed Opportunities: How We Keep High Quality Teachers Out of Urban Classrooms, revealed that districts are turning off the best-qualified candidates. Withdrawers had higher GPAs and were 40 percent more likely to have a degree in their teaching field than the eventual new hires. In addition, between 37 percent and 69 percent were candidates for hard-to-fill positions.

The majority of withdrawers – 50 to 70 percent – cited the late timeline as a major reason for taking other jobs, although almost half said they definitely or probably would have accepted an offer from the urban district if it had come earlier. In addition, four out of five applicants said that despite the problems, they would like to be considered again for urban teaching position.

The report was prepared by national nonprofit The New Teacher Project (TNTP) and funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation and Washington Mutual. The report analyzes data collected from four “hard-to-staff” geographically and demographically representative urban districts that participated in the study on the condition of anonymity. They include three large districts in the Southwest, Midwest and Eastern regions of the United States, and a mid-size urban district in the Midwest.

“The report shows that with stepped-up recruitment efforts, there are large quantities of highly-qualified teachers seeking challenging positions in urban classrooms,” says Michelle Rhee, CEO and President of TNTP. “But states, districts and unions must work collectively to restructure the hiring processes in urban districts to ensure that highly qualified teachers are available to the students who need them the most.”

Hiring Policies Fail Urban Districts, Students
The districts in the report average just fewer than 73,000 students each, and the largest district is home to more than 150,000 students. The percentage of non-white students in the districts ranges from 62 percent to 85 percent. Between two-thirds and three-quarters of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. In addition to citing ineffective bureaucratic practices, the report outlined three major policies that drove hiring delays and inefficiencies in the districts studied:

	Vacancy notification requirements that allow retiring or resigning teachers to offer very late notice of their intent to depart, making it difficult to accurately forecast which vacancies will exist in September. Three districts in the study had a summer notification deadline for departing teachers or none at all, while the fourth had a mid-may requirement that was rarely enforced. Moreover, teachers notifying early were often penalized by the loss of summer benefits or jobs.
	Union transfer requirements that give existing teachers first pick of openings before any new teacher can be hired. Timetables in union contracts and local laws undermine expedited transfer processes by extending transfer decisions until a few months, weeks, or, in some cases days before schools reopen. Collective bargaining policies requiring schools to hire transferring teachers create additional delays by making principals reluctant to post vacancies and interview for fear of being forced to accept a transferring teacher they don’t want.
	Late budget timetables and inadequate forecasting which foster chronic budget uncertainties and leave administrators unsure about which positions will be funded in their schools. State budget timelines are a major source of the budget delay and uncertainty. In 46 states, the fiscal year does not end until June 30; even then states may not need to pass a budget if they seek an extension.

“The experience of these four districts is not unique,” says Jessica Levin, chief knowledge officer of TNTP and a co-author of the report. “Most large urban school districts face the same challenges in hiring enough qualified teachers, thanks to the same hiring policies and timetables that hamstring even their best efforts.”

The report calls for states, districts and unions to revise teacher notification requirements, reform collective bargaining requirements to speed up the transfer process and enable schools and principals to consider external and internal candidates equally, insulate highest-need schools from budget fluctuations, and revamp the roles and systems of human resources departments to give schools a more prominent role in an accelerated hiring process.

The report was written by Jessica Levin and Meredith Quinn, director of strategic consulting initiatives at TNTP. The report is available at TNTP’s Web site, www.tntp.org.

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