New Research Shows Parents of Students in High-Poverty Schools Value Teachers Who Raise Achievement

(STANFORD, Calif. ) - When it comes to teachers, what do parents value most -- high student test scores or the ability to keep students satisfied? The answer depends in part on what kind of school you go to, according to a new study in the summer issue of Education Next.

According to economists Brian A. Jacob of the University of Michigan and Lars Lefgren of Brigham Young University, parents in high-poverty schools strongly value a teacher’s ability to raise student achievement and appear less concerned about student satisfaction. In more-affluent schools the results are reversed: parents most value a teacher’s ability to keep students happy.

“Our findings suggest that what parents want from school is likely to depend on the educational context in which they find themselves,” Jacob and Lefgren write. In low-income schools where academic resources are scarcer, motivated parents are more likely to request teachers based on their perceived ability to improve academic achievement. On the other hand, in higher-income schools parents seem to respond to the relative abundance of academic resources by seeking out teachers who also increase student satisfaction. This may reflect parental preferences for having their children enjoy school, Jacob and Lefgren speculate, or parental preferences for teachers who emphasize academic facets that increase student satisfaction but are not captured by standardized test scores, such as critical thinking and curiosity.

Jacob and Lefgren’s findings suggest that different socioeconomic groups are likely to react quite differently to accountability policies, such as those embodied in No Child Left Behind.

“In more-affluent schools, parents are likely to oppose measures that increase the focus on standardized test scores at the cost of student satisfaction,” note the researchers. “And programs that increase the focus on basic skills or classroom management at the expense of student enjoyment are also likely to be unpopular in the more-affluent schools.”

Jacob and Lefgren drew their data from 12 elementary schools in a midsized school district in the western United States. Achievement levels in the district nearly match the average of the nation (49th percentile on the Stanford Achievement Test). Seventy-three percent of the students in the district are white, roughly 35 percent of whom are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. Twenty-one percent of the students are Latino, 84 percent of whom are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch.

For their study, Jacob and Lefgren combined data on parent requests for specific teachers and principals’ evaluations of the teachers. Parents were able to submit requests for specific teachers during the spring or summer, when principals were planning their schedules for the following school year, though the district had no formal procedure for such requests. Principals assigned students to classes with an eye toward balancing race, gender, and ability across classrooms within the same grade and reported that they were generally able to honor almost all parent requests.

With the assistance of the district, Jacob and Lefgren linked the parental request data to administrative data on teachers and students. The researchers also administered a survey to all elementary school principals in the district, asking them to evaluate their teachers in a number of categories, including dedication and work ethic, organization, classroom management, parent satisfaction, positive relationship with administrators, student satisfaction, role model value for students, and the ability to raise math and reading achievement.

In addition to what their research revealed about parent preferences, Jacob and Lefgren’s findings suggest that the parents of low-income, minority, and low-achieving children are much less likely to take advantage of informal opportunities to exercise choice by requesting a specific teacher for their child. In the district the researchers studied, families who were not eligible for the federal lunch program are about twice as likely to request a teacher for their child as those that are eligible.

Read “In Low-Income Schools, Parents Want Teachers Who Teach” in the new issue of Education Next now online at EducationNext.org.

Brian Jacob is the Walter H. Annenberg Professor of Education Policy, Director of the Center for Local, State and Urban Policy, and a professor of economics at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. He is also a faculty research fellow with the National Bureau of Economic Research. Lars Lefgren is an associate professor of economics at Brigham Young University.

Education Next is a scholarly journal published by the Hoover Institution that is committed to looking at hard facts about school reform. Other sponsoring institutions are the Harvard Program on Education Policy and Governance and the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation.