Articles

Lessons learned: New teachers talk about their jobs, challenges and long-range plans

Public Agenda Alert
Oct. 10, 2007

This new report by Public Agenda and the National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality finds new teachers in middle and high school feel most vulnerable to challenging teaching conditions.

Compared to new teachers in elementary schools, high school and middle school teachers are much more concerned about administrative support, more frustrated by student motivation and behavior, less likely to see teaching as a lifelong career choice and less likely to believe that all students can achieve in school.

This the first in a series of reports based on a nationwide survey of first-year teachers and aims to help leaders in education and government understand more about the quality of current teacher education and the on-the-job support and mentoring for new teachers. Questionnaire design and analysis is in cooperation with REL-Midwest.

It may be that many of those who pursue teaching in secondary schools have different motivations from the start compared to those who choose to teach in elementary schools. The new high school and middle school teachers are less likely to say that teaching is something they’ve wanted to do for a long time (52 percent for secondary teachers versus 68 percent for elementary teachers) and they are less likely to agree strongly that it’s what they really want to be doing now (47 percent versus 61 percent).

What does get secondary teachers jazzed? Most new teachers say that the idea of teaching subjects they love and helping underprivileged students are more important reasons for choosing the profession than practical advantages such as summers off and job security. But for the new high school teachers, teaching a subject they love is an even more important factor.

You can download a copy of the full report at: http://www.publicagenda.org/LessonsLearned1

Copyright 2007 Public Agenda

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