PROTOCOL: Protocol for a Systematic Review: Teach For America (TFA) for Improving Math, Language Arts, and Science Achievement of Primary and Secondary Students in the United States: A Systematic Review (original) (raw)

Campbell Systematic Reviews

BACKGROUND Description of the Condition Research shows a shortage of effective teachers in many rural and urban K-12 public schools serving the highest proportions of high-poverty students across the US (Clotfelter, Ladd & Vigdor, 2006; Peske & Haycock, 2006; Monk, 2007). This shortage has persisted for decades (Darling-Hammond, 1984; Ingersoll 2001; Ingersoll & Perda, 2010). In the past decade, alternative route teacher preparation programs aimed at addressing this shortage proliferated across the United States (Kane, Rockoff, & Staiger, 2007). Alternative route teacher preparation programs seek to increase the supply of teachers more rapidly than traditional teacher preparation programs (Hess, 2002; Raymond & Fletcher, 2002; Blazer, 2012). Although their requirements vary widely, most of these programs are shorter, less expensive, and more practically oriented than traditional teacher preparation programs (Blazer, 2102). These programs also vary widely in their selection criteria for teacher candidates, approach to training these candidates, notoriety among education stakeholders, and evidence of their effectiveness (Hess, 2002; Kaine, Rockoff, & Staiger, 2007; Constantine et al. 2009). Teach For America (TFA) is nationally recognized as an alternate route teacher preparation program that has sought to address the shortage of effective teachers specifically in high-poverty rural and urban schools across the US (Teach For America, 2010). TFA stands out among its peer preparation programs for several reasons. TFA is the largest source of new teachers and is the largest recipient of philanthropic funding for teacher recruitment for K-12 education (Blazer, 2012; Mead, 2015). Since 1990, TFA has recruited, selected, trained, placed, and supported approximately 25,000 new public school teachers (corps members) in the highest-poverty school districts in rural and urban areas. As of 2010, TFA corps members, represented between 10-15% of all new hires in high-poverty schools in the 35 regions served by TFA. In the 2013-14 school year alone, 11,000 TFA corps members reached more than 750,000 students in high-poverty K-12 rural and urban schools. 1 TFA is also the most publicly visible and widely debated alternative route teacher preparation program as noted by the Conner P. Williams (2014) article entitled "Stop Scapegoating Teach for America." 2 Finally, TFA is the most evaluated program of its kind. There have been multiple quasi-experimental and experimental studies conducted on the effectiveness of TFA to improve student outcomes. However, this body of primary studies has not yet been 1 Data from a randomized controlled trial conducted in 2004 of students in 17 study schools with TFA corps members were on average 66% African American and 25% Latino/Hispanic. Approximately 95% of students in these schools received free or reduced price lunches, and began the year, on average, at the 14th percentile compared to the national norm (Decker, Mayer, & Glazerman, 2004).