Former Teachers Who Return to Public Schools: District and Teacher Characteristics of Teachers Who Return to the Districts They Left

Abstract

This is a companion article to “Teachers Who Interrupt Their Careers: Characteristics of Those Who Return to the Classroom” ( Beaudin, 1993a ). The research summarized in the prior article was directed at understanding the composition of the teacher “reserve pool” at the state level. It examined teacher characteristics, experience, subject-area specialty, and opportunity costs that distinguished teachers who returned to public schools in Michigan from those who did not. In the following article, the analysis is conducted at the district level. Using maximum likelihood logistic regression analysis, district and teacher characteristics are identified that differentiate teachers who return to the districts they left from those who return to other public school districts in the state. The findings show teachers return to the districts they left if the districts paid higher first-year salaries and had higher levels of educational funding and higher pupil-teacher ratios than other districts in the state. More experienced teachers who interrupted their careers for one year, females, older, and Black teachers were more likely to return to the districts they left than to other school districts.