Economics

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Teacher Qualifications and Student Academic Achievement
(2009) Wong, Monique; Jilani, Saleha
This study examines whether teacher qualifications are related to student academic achievement, specifically, we examine the relationship between fifth grade student achievement in mathematics and reading and various indicators of teacher qualifications such as teacher certification, teaching experience and teacher’s education level. This research design takes advantage of the National Childhood Longitudinal Study of Kindergarten Class of 1998-1999 (ECLS-K). The analysis indicates that elementary school certification promotes student achievement in both fifth grade mathematics and reading, while teacher’s teaching experience matters more for reading than mathematics. In terms of teacher education, we found no significant effects on increasing students’ test scores. However, our results indicate that students’ race, their parents’ education level, and their socioeconomic status have a larger effect on test scores than teachers’ education, experience, or the general state certification.