Learning Centre

Teacher turnover is three times higher at Los Angeles’ charter schools than at traditional campuses, even while student enrollment continues to grow at the independently run campuses, according to two studies to be released today.

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, tracked traditional and charter campuses within Los Angeles Unified’s attendance boundaries from 2002 to 2009 – a time when the number of charters soared from 53 to 157.

They found that teachers at elementary charter students had 33 percent higher odds of leaving by year’s end than their peers at traditional campuses. The odds of leaving climbed to nearly four times for charter teachers at middle and high schools, the study found.

Meanwhile, charter students were up to 80 percent more likely to stay at their schools than those attending their traditional neighborhood schools.

Bruce Fuller, an education and public policy professor at UC Berkeley who worked on both studies, said the findings are of particular interest in Los Angeles, which has more students enrolled at charter schools than any other district in the country.

“One announced goal of charter schools is to develop deeper, more motivating relationships with kids,” Fuller said. “That is going to be an empty promise if we continue to see such high rates of teacher turnover.”

Charter school operators agreed that their rate of teacher turnover is higher than at traditional schools, but some said that is simply a product of higher expectations and higher accountability.

“We push our teachers very hard to achieve … and because it’s a smaller, less anonymous environment, what you do in the classroom is more visible to a school leader and other teachers,” said Jackie Elliott, co-founder and CEO Partnerships to Uplift Communities, which operates 12 charter campuses.

“Sometimes that is more uncomfortable for people. … That kind of pressure isn’t for everybody.”

Yvonne Chan, founder of Vaughn Next Century Learning Center in Pacoima, said charters tend to attract ambitious and energetic employees who want to move quickly up the career ladder.

“We are a real boot camp for the inspired,” Chan said.

“We train them within two years and then they move on to do other types of school reform … open their own charter, magnet or pilot school.”

Chan said she tries to retain teachers at her cluster of schools by creating leadership opportunities that allow them to grow professionally while staying at her campus.

Elliott stressed that student loyalty rather than teacher retention is a more accurate measurement of a school’s success.

“Part of the reason that students remain at their charter schools is because there are greater attempts to meet students’ unique needs and engage them,” Elliott said.

“I don’t think that level of personalization only occurs when teachers have been there for a long period of time, though. That’s an attitude and a culture that has to permeate an entire campus. It’s not just one person.”

Similarly, Los Angeles Unified Superintendent John Deasy said he would have liked to have seen student performance included in the UC Berkeley studies.

“I’m more interested in the results of a school,” Deasy said. “If students are doing well and there is high turnover … maybe turnover is not a factor, especially if students are choosing to stay.”

Deasy also said the studies were incomplete because they did not analyze the reasons for teacher turnover or student retention.

The reports also found that Latino teachers and students were 25 percent less likely than their white counterparts to transfer to other schools – either traditional or charter. Black students were up to 30 percent more likely to transfer than Latino students.

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