There's a lot going on in the world right now, but in some good news: @alexmoran.bsky.social defended his dissertation today! Alex is such a smart, thoughtful ed policy researcher and the field is beyond lucky to have him. I hope I did a better job advising than I did taking this photo.

We draw on a variety of other survey measures on organizational commitment and working conditions, and find that improvement goal buy-in, climate, leadership, and school safety are all associated with lower intent to turn over and actual turnover behavior. 3/5

Linking teacher survey data to statewide administrative data at the teacher level, we find intent to turn over is predictive of immediate turnover, but that turnover behavior can lag behind intent. This extends past research that can only observe teachers for one year after reported intent. 2/5

These factors contributed to disrupted learning in turnaround districts and especially turnaround schools--those schools that were aiming to improve before the pandemic. This undermined improvement efforts and students made slower learning gains than elsewhere in the state during the pandemic.

And turnaround districts remained remote for longer than others in MI, further amplifying the role of these disruptions in student learning.

In turn, students engaged with especially salient challenges related to new at-home responsibilities, parent/guardian job loss, food insecurity, and housing instability. These factors contributed to an especially challenging at-home learning context.

The communities they serve had higher case and death rates, especially in the pandemic's early days, and more deaths per confirmed case. In turn, students experienced significant learning disruptions, especially in turnaround schools.

We also show that school organizational conditions and organizational commitment are important factors in teacher intentions to leave their school, and, to a lesser degree their actual turnover behavior.

We have a new post for Brookings on teacher intentions and actual turnover! Most teachers stay after 1 yr regardless of expressed intent--but intent becomes increasingly predictive over a 3-year period.
www.brookings.edu/articles/the...

Based on our working paper at edworkingpapers.com/ai23-815

From me & @betsyjwolf.bsky.social! We show that states can offset loss of stability in growth measures by using multiple years of data for school ratings. Also: growth generates more equitable ratings than proficiency--but still disproportionately penalizes high-poverty, high-URM schools.

We have an assistant professor position open in education policy at Florida State, with a focus on teaching in the EdD program. Info below, and I'd be very happy to chat with anyone who has questions about the department, FSU, or anything else you might be wondering about! bit.ly/3rnsk6n