Teacher licensure issues on the academic achievement rate of sixth-grade students.

摘要

Having spent several years as a middle school principal and assistant principal in rural North Carolina, and several years in the Human Resources department, I offer first hand knowledge of the use of various certified and licensed teachers and how they impacted student achievement. My interest in teacher certification is a result of my involvement with North Carolina's accountability program, the ABC's of Public Education, plus the newer requirements behind the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) program. In addition to the certification factors, another reason school leaders like myself are interested in certification and achievement is a direct result of confronting the national teacher shortage.; The debate over teacher certification and its effect on children is wide spread, particularly now that NCLB has added additional content requirements for middle grade and higher teachers. The purpose of this study was to determine whether 6th grade students taught by elementary certified teachers and those taught by middle grades certified teachers had significantly different achievement gains on North Carolina's End-of Grade test in reading and/or mathematics.; A sample of 94 teachers, 48 with an elementary pedagogy licensure, 30 with middle grades content licensure, and 16 that were certified in both elementary and middle grades from one large North Carolina school system participated in the study. In order to conduct a valid gain score analysis of variance (ANOVA) using an ex post facto design, 5,626 different student 5th grade test scores were used as the covariate to help limit outside influences. A quasi-experimental design consisting of pretest and posttest scores was used in this study. A statistically significant difference did not exist in the student achievement rates in reading or mathematics between the elementary licensed teachers and the middle grades licensed teachers. The results of this study add to the database of continuing research on the effects of teacher certification on student achievement.