Does Cooperating Teachers’ Instructional Effectiveness Improve Preservice Teachers’ Future Performance?

Abstract

Increasingly, states and teacher education programs are establishing minimum requirements for cooperating teachers’ (CTs’) years of experience or tenure. Undergirding these policies is an assumption that to effectively mentor preservice teachers (PSTs), CTs must themselves be instructionally effective. We test this assumption using statewide administrative data on nearly 2,900 PSTs mentored by over 3,200 CTs. We find the first evidence, of which we are aware, that PSTs are more instructionally effective when they learn to teach with CTs who are more instructionally effective. Specifically, when their CTs received higher observational ratings and value-added to students’ achievement measures (VAMs), PSTs also received higher observational ratings and VAM during their first years of teaching; CTs’ years of teaching experience, though, were mostly unrelated to these outcomes. These findings have implications for teacher education program leaders and policymakers who seek to recruit and set requirements for CTs who are more likely to support PSTs’ future instructional effectiveness.

Exploring the Impact of Student Teaching Apprenticeships on Student Achievement and Mentor Teachers

“…The lack of heterogeneity of the estimated effects by the effectiveness of the mentor teacher is also an important finding. There is currently wide variation in the effectiveness of teachers assigned as a mentor teachers (Goldhaber et al, 2018); a related literature suggests that mentees are better off in the long-run (in terms of their future productivity) when they have a more effective mentor (Goldhaber et al, 2018;Matsko et al, 2018;Ronfeldt et al, 2018), and our findings suggest that there are few short-run costs to the students in the classrooms hosting student teachers. A possible implication of this for policy and practice is that school districts and teacher education programs should have less concern about placing student teachers in classrooms out of fear that these interns harm students.…”

“…4 Similarly, locally negotiated memorandums of understanding between TEPs and school systems tend to focus on the broad nature of the student teaching experience without getting into the specifics of whether internships ought to take place in specific types of schools or be overseen by specific types of mentor teachers (Goldhaber, Krieg, & Theobald, 2014). 2012,2015) and mentor teachers Ronfeldt, Brockman, & Campbell, 2018) influence the later outcomes of student teachers who become public school teachers. Importantly for this study, both Goldhaber et al (2018) and Ronfeldt et al (2018) find that teachers tend to have higher value when the mentor teacher of their student teaching placement has higher value added, all else equal, though Goldhaber et al (2018) document that this relationship decays somewhat after candidates enter the workforce.…”

“…2012,2015) and mentor teachers Ronfeldt, Brockman, & Campbell, 2018) influence the later outcomes of student teachers who become public school teachers. Importantly for this study, both Goldhaber et al (2018) and Ronfeldt et al (2018) find that teachers tend to have higher value when the mentor teacher of their student teaching placement has higher value added, all else equal, though Goldhaber et al (2018) document that this relationship decays somewhat after candidates enter the workforce.…”

Evaluating quality in professional experience partnerships for graduate teacher employability

“…These partnerships between ITE providers and schools generate and advance their shared perspectives and priorities for teaching and learning that contribute to knowledgeable teaching graduates (Darling-Hammond, 2010). Moreover, emerging evidence is indicating that pre-service teachers who are supervised by instructionally effective supervising mentor teachers show enhanced capacity (Ronfeldt, Brockman, & Campbell, 2018). Engagement between university-based teacher educators and supervising mentor teachers is providing evidence that this interaction makes the developmental needs of pre-service teachers more overt and more connected to the interactions that characterise partnership activities, as well as shifting the discourse about preparing teachers from a deficit view to one of shared concern and care ( Grimmett, Forgasz, Williams, & White, 2018).…”

How Research Sheds Light on the Pivotal Role of Mentors in Teacher Preparation

“…Over the years, those of us engaged in the work of supporting the preparation of beginning teachers have been developing a deeper understanding of the consequential aspects of mentor-mentee relationships. We have learned, for example, that there are specific ways in which MTs can help to shape the professional identity of those they mentor (e.g., Izadinia, 2015Izadinia, , 2016; that TCs teach more effectively when they work with MTs who are themselves instructionally effective (Ronfeldt, Brockman, & Campbell, 2018); and that school context can shape the form and content of feedback given, as well as the uptake by TCs (McGraw & Davis, 2017). Five of the articles in this issue contribute to our understanding concerning the role and impact of mentors.…”