Examining the ancillary benefits of educational programs on school communities

Philanthropies are uniquely positioned to explore ancillary benefits of multiple programs working toward similar ends. Non-profits are typically heads-down on measuring and evaluating the impact of their programs. Resource constraints—personnel and financial—make it difficult for non-profit leaders to widen their lens and consider, let alone systematically examine, unanticipated positive effects of their programs.

We’ve had the privilege of partnering with the Overdeck Family Foundation (Overdeck) to do research that takes a unique view on the benefits of auxiliary staffing and teacher residency programs. These terms are short-hand to describe programs that, in the case of auxiliary staffing, add adults to classrooms with the aim of improving student outcomes and that, in the case of residency programs, place aspiring teachers with experienced host teachers as part of their certification.

We have created this space to share resources related to this project. Our final report is available, and we are in the process of disseminating our findings via scholarly journals and conferences, as well as practitioner-friendly media. The dissemination effort is ongoing, so we will use this space to share resources as they become available.

The Opportunity

Overdeck approached us with an idea for a research project involving auxiliary staffing and teacher residency programs. Rather than examine the efficacy of these programs, Overdeck wanted to learn more about alternative ways in which these programs provide value to schools in the short and longer term.

The seed for this idea was planted by Overdeck’s experience working with both residential and auxiliary staffing programs, as well as their observations of the evolving ways in which policymakers and districts view these programs. In deciding where to invest resources, policymakers sometimes invoke a tension between investing in teacher preparation programs versus investing in programs that provide direct services to students. Their starting hypothesis was that maybe there isn’t a tension – perhaps residency programs can provide some of the same short-term impact that auxiliary staffing programs offer. Likewise, auxiliary staffing programs, which typically provide direct services to students, may also be a fruitful source of teacher talent and serve as “apprentice” programs for young professionals.

In deciding where to invest resources, policymakers sometimes invoke a tension between investing in teacher preparation programs versus investing in programs that provide direct services to students.

What We Set Out to Learn

Program effectiveness is usually measured based on the program’s impact on the groups they directly serve. For example, programs that offer direct services to students typically measure and report on their impact on the students they serve, while teacher professional development programs measure their impact on the teachers they train. Researchers understandably follow suit, focusing their efforts on quantifying these programs’ impact on the individuals they serve. For example, researchers study the impact of tutoring programs on student achievement in high need schools, and they study how effective teacher pipeline programs are at training, placing, and retaining high quality teachers.

Yet, because these programs operate in broader school ecosystems, each type of program may also have ancillary or indirect benefits. A program that strives to impact teachers may also impact students. Likewise, a program that aims to directly serve students may also have benefits for program staff and teachers.

Our research flipped the script on the typical research conducted on these programs. We studied the ancillary benefits of both residency and auxiliary staffing programs. Our specific questions were:

  1. What is the added value of hosting residency personnel in a classroom, as measured by improved teacher effectiveness scores during the year of the residency?
  2. What percentage of auxiliary staffing staff members go on to become teachers? Do alumni have higher retention rates than teachers who did not previously work for auxiliary staffing programs?
Because these programs operate in broader school ecosystems, each type of program may also have ancillary or indirect benefits.

What We Learned

Residency programs

We examine whether teachers show greater effectiveness — a proxy for student achievement — in the years in which they host a resident in the classroom. We learn that host teachers in some programs — namely those using a mentor model in which host teachers mentor teachers in training during the residency year — do have higher teacher effectiveness scores when they host a resident. In contrast, in the one program we observed where teachers merely hosted rather than mentored residents, we did not find an effect of hosting a resident.

Articles and briefs:

Casciano, R., Bohra-Mishra, P., & Puma, J. (2020) “Estimating an ancillary benefit of teacher residency programs.” Under review.

NCTR research brief: Impact of Resident-Mentor Pairs on Teacher Effectiveness

Podcast episode: Jen and Rebecca talk about teacher residency programs

A version of this paper was presented at AERA 2020.

We also presented our work on resident mentorship at AERA 2021.

Auxiliary staffing programs

Using students’ state test scores as a proxy of teacher effectiveness, we do not find that auxiliary staffing alumni teachers are more effective than a matched sample of comparison teachers. However, across the three cohorts of teachers included in the analysis, auxiliary staffing teachers have higher retention rates compared to the matched comparison group of teachers, with the difference being statistically significant.

Podcast episode: Jen and Rebecca talk about auxiliary staffing programs

Tutor-to-teacher pipeline webinar:

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