ABSTRACT
This report uses Spring 2022 data from nationally representative surveys of principals and math teachers in kindergarten through grade 12 (K-12) to explore students' opportunities to prepare for and take advanced math. The authors found that small high schools, high schools in rural areas, and high schools that predominantly serve students from historically marginalized communities tend to offer fewer advanced math courses (e.g., precalculus, Advanced Placement math courses) and that uneven access to advanced math begins in middle school. K-12 teachers who work in schools that predominately serve students living in poverty are more likely to report skipping standards-aligned content and replacing the skipped content with concepts from previous grade levels. Also, more than half of K-12 math teachers said they need additional support for delivering high-quality math instruction, especially teachers who work in schools that serve predominantly high-poverty students. In the wake of the disproportionate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on students living in poverty and students of color, these results highlight a critical need for resources to support teachers and to increase student access to advanced courses. [For technical information about the surveys and analysis in this report, see "Learn Together Surveys. 2022 Technical Documentation and Survey Results. Research Report. RR-A827-9" (ED626092).]
ABSTRACT
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic upended math instruction--but not equitably. Although little is known about the quality of math instruction in different school settings during the 2020-2021 school year, evidence from national survey data collected throughout the pandemic suggests that students' "opportunity to learn" (OTL)--defined here as time on instruction and content coverage--differed dramatically depending on whether students were learning in person or through an alternative mode of instruction. This Date Note presents findings from the 2020 and 2021 Learn Together Surveys to highlight the challenges to standards-aligned instruction that secondary (grades 6 to 12) math teachers might have perceived one year into the pandemic, how frequently they skipped standards-aligned math content, and their reasons for doing so. These findings add to the growing body of evidence showing that students in fully remote and hybrid school settings had fewer opportunities to engage with grade-level math than students learning in person. Specifically, secondary math teachers who provided remote or hybrid instruction reported skipping standards-aligned content more frequently and were less likely to report being able to devote as much time as they would have liked to math instruction compared with their in-person counterparts. These findings are particularly significant for students who attended schools that were less likely to offer in-person instruction during the 2020-2021 school year.
ABSTRACT
Principal and teacher well-being is a matter of immediate concern for principals and teachers themselves and for the students they teach. Stress on the job can negatively affect educators' physical health, and poor teacher wellness and mental health are linked with lower-quality student learning environments and with poorer academic and nonacademic student outcomes. Furthermore, previous research suggests that principals and teachers of color are more likely than their White peers to experience poor well-being and are more likely to leave their jobs. Understanding the relationships among teacher and principal well-being, perceived working conditions, and teachers' and principals' intentions to leave their current position is critical for pandemic recovery and for the long-term health of the principal and teacher workforce. In this report, researchers present selected findings from the 2022 State of the American Teacher (SoT) and State of the American Principal (SoP) surveys. These findings are related to teacher and principal well-being, working conditions, and intentions to leave their jobs. The authors focus specifically on the well-being and working conditions of educators of color. [For technical information about the surveys and analysis in this report, see "State of the American Teacher and State of the American Principal Surveys: 2022 Technical Documentation and Survey Results" (ED621137).]
ABSTRACT
In a time when simply carrying out the essential functions of their jobs is a herculean task, educators have been faced with the additional challenge of addressing contentious, politicized topics in their schools and classrooms. Drawing from nationally representative samples of teachers and principals who completed the 2022 State of the American Teacher and the State of the American Principal surveys and teacher interviews, the authors focus their analysis on two especially politically salient issues: (1) how to implement COVID-19 safety measures with the return to in-person schooling;and (2) the role and emphasis that discussions about race, racism, or bias may or should have in schools. They investigate how these two highly politicized topics might contribute to elevated job-related stress by examining potential contributing factors, such as the extent to which educators must manage conflicting beliefs and opinions, the adequacy of support they receive, and the hostility and aggression that they experience from others in response to related policies. The authors also explore differences by educator- and school-level characteristics. Although politicized topics are more contested in some school settings and locales than in others, survey results suggest that educators' beliefs about how schools should manage politicized issues vary within all kinds of school communities. The authors explore the consequences of politicization for educators' instructional practices, well-being, perceptions of their school and district climate, and intentions to leave their jobs. They provide implications and recommendations on how to support educators in navigating politicized issues in their schools and classrooms in a way that fosters productive discourse between communities and schools. [For the "State of the American Teacher and State of the American Principal Surveys: 2022 Technical Documentation and Survey Results. Research Report. RR-A1108-3," see ED621137.]