Hometown Disadvantage? It Depends on Where You're From: Teachers' Location Preferences and the Implications for Staffing Schools

• Published in: Educational evaluation and policy analysis 2012-06, Vol.34 (2), p.127-145
• Main Author: Reininger, Michelle
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Art teachers; Bachelors degrees; Beginning Teachers; College Graduates; Comparative Analysis; Data Analysis; Employment Patterns; Faculty Mobility; Geographic Location; High school graduates; High school students; High schools; Longitudinal Studies; Place of Residence; Preferences; Proximity; Secondary school teachers; Shortages; Studies; Teacher Attitudes; Teacher Shortage; Teacher Supply and Demand; Teachers; Teaching (Occupation); Test scores; Workforce
• ISSN: 0162-3737; 1935-1062
• DOI: 10.3102/0162373711420864

This article focuses on an overlooked factor in the unequal sorting of teachers across schools: the geographic preferences of teachers. Using data from the National Education Longitudinal Study, the author examines the patterns of geographic mobility of new teachers and compares them to the patterns of other college graduates. Specifically, the author demonstrates that teachers' preference for working close to where they grew up is a distinct characteristic of teachers, and the author further explores the implications of those preferences for schools facing chronic shortages of teachers. The author finds that the local nature of the labor force and the differential rates of graduation and production of teachers from traditionally hard-to-staff schools are reinforcing existing deficits of local teacher labor supply.