a review of persistent & emerging issues in rural education: insights from recent economics of...

A Review of Persistent & Emerging Issues In Rural Education: Insights from

Recent Economics of Education Research

Elton MykereziUniversity of Minnesota

Applied EconomicsCenter for Community Vitality, UM Extension

Preview• Fundamental features of rural areas• Overview of literature on rural education• Conceptual links between “rurality” and education research• Teacher labor markets:

– How do they differ in rural areas?– Rural-urban differences in teacher career paths

• Teacher human resources reform– Measuring “teacher quality”– Pay for performance

• Political economy of school finance– Willingness to pay for schools – School consolidation

• Concluding remarks, policy implications and further research

Fundamental Features or Rural Areas

• Low population density– Economies of scale – Political economy (of school funding)– Thin/sparse labor markets– Lower returns to education– Income and poverty– General provision of public goods/services– Less diverse private sector (implications for private amenities)– Social capital & quality of life

• Distance from other population centers– Reduced competition in education (open enrollment, charter

schools, private schools)– Difficulties in collaboration– Sparse private sector

Rural-Urban Differences in Schooling

1970 1980 1990 2000 2006-10 2008-120%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Metro Non Metro

1970 1980 1990 2000 2006-10 2008-120%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

Metro Non Metro

% Adults with no High School

% Adults with BS or More

Are Rural Schools Different?

• Literature is inconclusive on performance differentials in rural schools– Definitions of Rural– Heterogeneity across Rural areas

• Finding out When and Why?– Focus on fundamental features– Finding out “Why” is very demanding– When do differences in outcomes arise?

Cohort Analysis

• A view of NLSY 97– Nearly 9,000 youth of age 12-18 when first interviewed– Followed into their 30s– All took achievement tests on 2nd year

• Path of Differences in Educational Outcomes– Some achievement gaps appear early– Gaps remain the same during high school– No differences in SAT/ACT taking or scores– Lower college enrollment than predicted by achievement

gaps– Migration heavily responsible for adult education gaps

Literature on Rural Teachers• Rural schools have difficulties recruiting teachers;

rural teachers are:– Less likely to hold an MS degree or more– More likely to have a BS in teaching– Less likely to be licensed for subject– Fewer professional development opportunities– Similar tenure profiles– More likely to report high job satisfaction– Less likely to report issues with discipline

• Studies tend to compare teacher credentials, pay, attitudes, etc.

Literature Gaps on Teachers

• Very little comprehensive analysis of occupation choice differences – Only Miller (2012) with data from NY

• Little to no context on teacher labor markets in general

• Too much focus on “signals” (e.g. degrees, certificates, licenses, professional development)– These do not predict output-based teacher quality

Teacher Labor Markets

• Teacher pay is fully determined by level of education and experience in teaching

• Teachers are overwhelmingly dismissed based on seniority alone (“last in-first out” rules)

• Factors such as aptitude, creativity, patience cannot be directly considered in career paths

• Cannot consider credentials such as elite schools, double majors/minors, languages, etc.

• Naturally compressed career paths (relatively low specialization by position)

Lifetime Earnings By Major and Occupation

All

Engin

eerin

g

Math &

Tech

.

Scien

ces

Business

Soc. S

ciences

Bio. Scie

nce

Litera

ture

Libera

l Arts

/Human

ities

Psychology Art

Educati

on0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

4

4.5

All occupations Management Business & finance Production, etc.Education

Consequences of Wage Compression

• Individuals with more “productive” skills or desirable credentials are more difficult to recruit and easier to lose– Supply demand imbalances exist nationwide

• STEM, foreign languages, special ed. in short supply• General ed., humanities, etc., are oversupplied

• Competition on “Marginal Teacher” not possible

• Non wage job attributes become disproportionally important

Career Paths by Subject.0

1.0

2.0

3.0

4.0

5D

en

sity

0 10 20 30 40Experience at exit

All

Art, Literature, Language, Social Sciences

kernel = epanechnikov, bandwidth = 1.6924

1. Liberal Arts and Social Sciences VS. All Teachers

.01

.02

.03

.04

.05

Den

sity


All

Administrators


2. Exit Profile of Administrators VS. All Teachers

0.0

2.0

4.0

6D

en

sity


All

Foreign Language


3. Foreign Language VS. All Teachers

.01

.02

.03

.04

.05

Den

sity


Elementary

Math & Sciences


4. STEM VS. Gen. Ed./Elementary

Implications for Rural Schools

• All schools compete for “undersupplied” specializations

• Rural areas have fewer college educated adults (thin markets)

• Low returns to education in private markets is likely an advantage

• Relatively low-skill economies also likely an advantage in recruitment and retention

• Lower cost of living also likely an advantage

The marginal recruit

• Although rural schools pay less on average, absence of competition on ‘marginal recruits’ is likely a benefit– Schools cannot bid on a teacher, they have to raise

the whole salary schedule – Urban schools likely to win on individual bidding

wars due to higher budgets and economies of scale• Rural districts can use waivers to gain

flexibility; urban districts are more rigid

Non wage competition

• Well documented that senior teachers gravitate towards low-minority affluent schools

• Opportunity to compete for those who enjoy what rural areas offer (low discipline issues in school, low crime rates, social capital, natural amenities, etc.)

• Difficulties with public goods, private sector diversity (as an amenity), spousal opportunities, etc.

Career Paths by Subject and Location.0

1.0

2.0

3.0

4.0

5D

en

sity


City SuburbanTown Rural

1. All Teachers

0.0

2.0

4.0

6D

en

sity



2. STEM Teachers

.01

.02

.03

.04

.05

Den

sity



3. General Ed./Elementary

0.0

2.0

4.0

6D

en

sity



4. Foreign Language

Measuring teacher quality: Value Added Measures (VAM)

• Average standardized test score growth attributable to a teacher

• Output based measure, easy to compute• Only applicable to tested subjects and grades• Concerns with persistence over time and other

statistical properties (incl. variance)• “Teaching to the test” concerns• Has been found to predict success

– College, employment, wages, teen pregnancies– Teacher who is 1se above median produces $400K/year/class.

Multi-Measure Efforts

• Gates Foundation Measures of Effective Teaching (MET)

• Include peer observations– Observe practice (better than credentials)– Applicable to all teachers– Only observe maximal performance– Inter-rater reliability

• Student Surveys– College professors are familiar (with adult students)– Observe a combination of practice and outcome– Students likely not unbiased observers, and may convey

irrelevant information

Implications for Rural Areas• Nearly unstudied in a rural context• These are statistical measures, which will require

“norming”.• Not clear if peer and student observations work well in

high-social capital areas• States are starting to legislate evaluation based on these

measures (e.g. Minnesota)– Positive due to easier implementation– Negative due to thinner labor markets

• Universal signal of quality will make “poaching” more effective – Not clear how this would affect rural areas

Performance based Pay/Dismissal

• Very large increase in interest in this• Heterogeneous designs lead to very different impacts• Very few studies on it’s effects nationwide, not sure

there are any in a rural context. • Minnesota and Texas are good settings for studying P4P

in a rural context• Grantor-Grantee format, as in Race to the Top and

Teacher Incentive Fund– Contracts include individual and group bonuses, based on

standardized scores or other measures– Bonuses for “hard to staff” positions are increasingly excluded

from these

Implications for Rural Areas

• Performance-based dismissals can be hard with thin labor markets

• Performance pay can be used to ‘bid’ on marginal recruits

• Interesting to see if contract design & effect differs in rural areas:– E.g. are group-bonuses more

desirable/productive?

School Finance

• A matter of economies of scale– Raising more money– Using funds more effectively (much of the

previous literature is on this)• Research on “optimal” school size has

produced no consensus• Little consensus on even if marginal additions

to school budgets produce any results (e.g. Hanushek)

Funding Rural Schools

• Primary difficulty with looking at the impact of funds is that it cannot be separated from “community support”.

• Use of local referenda is a very promising mechanism. – Positive impact of school construction nationwide– Small positive impacts of operating budget funds

• No study focuses on rural schools– Marginal impact of extra funds is likely to differ

Willingness to Pay in MN: Referendum Results

Variable N Mean Std. Dev.

Urban

Share of districts with Ballot 243 0.251 0.435

Share Passing 61 0.639 0.484

Average 'Yes' vote share 57 0.532 0.098

Suburban




Town




Rural




Community Support, Funding and Consolidations

Consolidate

No Yes Total

Urban 10 0 10

Suburb 33 0 33

Town 75 12 87

Rural 218 87 305

Total 336 99 435

Years before merger Obs

Share with Ballot Std. Dev.

5 82 0.098 0.299

4 100 0.090 0.288

3 100 0.172 0.379

2 100 0.139 0.347

1 100 0.110 0.314

Years After Merger ObsShare with

Ballot Std. Dev.

0 71 0.056 0.232

1 70 0.157 0.367

2 71 0.183 0.390

3 70 0.143 0.352

4 68 0.162 0.371

Remarks

• Research needs to incorporate rural viewpoints into educational analysis

• Flexibility in pay is very important– Use federal and state programs to gain flexibility (e.g. The

Rural Education Achievement Program, and The Small, Rural School Grant Program)

• Partner with non-profit sector (e.g. Teach For America; the only organization to successfully predict teacher performance)– Started a rural program recently

• Start to implement evaluation systems early, to anticipate likely effects on labor force conditions

a review of persistent & emerging issues in rural education: insights from recent economics of...

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