Journal Issue: Excellence in the Classroom Volume 17 Number 1 Spring 2007
Graduate Education
Like many other professionals, teachers pursue graduate degrees either to enable entry into the field or to continue formal training once in the workforce.
Incentives and Requirements for Graduate Education
According to government statistics, approximately 45 percent of teachers have a master’s degree.2 Two types of master’s degree are typical. One is a Master of Arts in Teaching, usually earned in a one-year program by those seeking a career change through certification. The second is a more general degree, pursued by teachers already in the labor force. Although no firm data exist on the prevalence of either degree, government statistics show that the share of teachers holding master’s degrees jumps from 16 percent among those with three or fewer years of experience to 62 percent among those with more than twenty years of experience.3 A national survey found that roughly one-fifth of all mathematics and science teachers reported having taken a disciplinary or discipline- specific teaching methods course within the past three years.4 Wide enrollment in graduate programs appears common in the teacher labor force. Why?
One reason is that incentives for pursuing such a degree are strong. More than thirty states allow graduate coursework to count toward recertification requirements. Some districts require teachers to complete a master’s degree within several years of hiring. Many other districts provide salary increases for teachers who get a master’s or specialist’s degree. According to one report, the average salary increase is 11 percent for a master’s degree and 17 percent for an education specialist’s degree.5
What Do Teachers Do in Graduate Education?
Although participation in graduate education is common and although education reformers often recommend that master’s degrees be required, little is known about the content of graduate coursework.6 Existing studies tend to focus on the need for program redesign rather than on close examination of current offerings, but descriptions of these offerings suggest that many are of low intellectual quality, are disconnected from classroom practice, and are often fragmented, because teachers take courses to fulfill state requirements absent a coherent plan for learning.7 Peggy Blackwell and Mary Diez quote from one teacher educator who decries the “driveby” degree: “It’s pre-service warmed over. If you apply, you get in; and if you get in, you get out.”8 More recently, incentives have shifted toward teachers’ completing online master’s programs in education, as these courses require no commuting or classroom time, and in some cases much less work than courses in bricks-and-mortar programs. The prevalence of poor-quality learning experiences has historical precedent: Blackwell and Diez note that until the mid-1800s, master’s degrees were “essentially . . . an unearned degree given for a fee.”9 Understanding more about the content, rigor, and effects of online and traditional master’s degree programs is a key area for future study.
Can Graduate Education Improve Teaching and Learning?
A number of studies have addressed the link between teachers’ graduate degrees and student learning. In most cases, they find that having a master’s degree is unrelated to student achievement. The handful of studies that find significant links find both positive and negative effects.10 Thus the overall effect of graduate education on teacher productivity is likely close to zero. Significantly, though, most studies fail to determine whether a teacher’s advanced degree is related to the subject he or she teaches.11 Several studies that specifically examine the effects of teacher characteristics on high school students’ mathematics achievement find that having a master’s degree in mathematics significantly predicts student gains.12 This finding, however, has been replicated only with high school students and their teachers, and the significant effects may be an artifact of the statistical models used rather than an outcome of real teacher learning. More mathematically proficient teachers, in this scenario, would choose to complete a master’s degree in mathematics, and these more proficient teachers might improve student achievement even absent their higher degree. More rigorous studies are needed, including studies at other grade levels and for other subject areas.
Does Graduate Education Improve Teaching and Learning?
Overall, little evidence suggests that the system of graduate education improves the knowledge and skills pertinent to producing student learning. Teachers, responding to state or district incentives, pursue advanced degrees and coursework. Higher education institutions—and increasingly, online “institutions”— respond to this market by providing easy-to-obtain degrees of varying, probably poor, quality. Without policy intervention, there are few incentives for change in this system.
