Please join us for the upcoming presentation of the Maryland Longitudinal Data System (MLDS) Center Research Series Virtual Brown Bag. This brown bag is a forum to bring together researchers, policymakers, and practitioners to discuss in-progress research on academic and workforce outcomes.
Title: "Teacher Preparation, Localness, and Student Outcomes"
Date and Time: Thursday 18, 2025, 10:00 AM Eastern
LINK TO JOIN: September Research Series Zoom Link
Meeting ID: 939 8713 9445 | Passcode: 135743
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Presentation Abstract
Presenter: Dr. David Blazar, MLDS Center Research Branch and University of Maryland College Park
Prior research describes how teachers are more likely than other professionals to work close to their hometown and, partly as a result, there is increasing attention to "growing your own" (GYO) teachers through localized recruitment not only of high schoolers, but also of college students and career changers. We build on this work using linked teacher-student data from the Maryland Longitudinal Data System (MLDS) and a student fixed effects strategy to estimate the contribution of multiple dimensions of "localness" to student test-score gains. First, we find that teachers who return to teach in the school district they graduated from and those that earned a certificate from the high school Teacher Academy of Maryland program produce slightly larger student test-score gains than their peers. Second, teaching aides are also a focus of localized teacher recruitment and GYO efforts because of their connections to public schools. Teaching aides who become full-time teachers are older, more racially diverse, and more likely to enter the profession with a conditional certificate. They have similar effects on student test scores as their peers and are more likely to stay in teaching. Third, a separate group of conditionally certified teachers are younger and enter the profession shortly after college, often with local connections to Maryland K12 school systems or higher education institutions. This group of teachers exhibits smaller student test-score gains compared to other first-year teachers who enter the profession with other certificates/licenses. However, this difference gets smaller by their second year in the job. Ultimately, our findings identify some but not all dimensions of "localness" that are correlated with student test scores in the classroom.