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In 1999–2000, high school grade students in high-minority and high-poverty public schools were more often taught English, science, and mathematics by out-of-field teachers than their peers in low-minority and low-poverty public schools.
Some researchers hypothesize that teachers’ subject matter knowledge is associated with learning in the classroom. These researchers have found that students learn more from mathematics teachers who majored in mathematics than from teachers who did not (Goldhaber and Brewer 1997) and more from science and mathematics teachers who studied teaching methods in the subject they teach than from those who did not (Monk 1994; Goldhaber and Brewer 2000). These findings have prompted further examinations of “out-of-field” teachers (i.e., teachers who have neither a major nor certification in the subject they teach). Previous research has found that students in the middle grades are more likely than students in high schools to have out-of-field teachers (see NCES 2003–067, indicator 28). This indicator shows the proportion of middle and high school grade students in high-poverty and high-minority public schools who were taught by out-of-field teachers in selected subjects in 1999–2000.1
At the high school grade level, students in high-poverty schools were more likely to be taught English, science, and mathematics by an out-of-field teacher than students in low-poverty schools. The same held true for students in high-minority schools compared with students in low-minority schools. No measurable difference was detected in social studies (see tables 24-1, 24-2, 24-3, and 24-4).
By contrast, in the middle grades, the only difference detected was that students in low-minority schools were more likely to be taught social studies by an out-of-field teacher than students in high-minority schools (16 vs. 7 percent). There were no other measurable differences detected among students in high-minority and high-poverty public schools and their peers in low-minority and low-poverty public schools in English, science, social studies, and mathematics.
1The data used for this analysis are from a nationally representative sample of full- and part-time teachers rather than of students. Thus, this indicator presents the percentage of the sampled set of middle and high school grade teachers’ students who are in classes with a teacher teaching outside his or her field. For ease of presentation, this percentage will be referred to as the percentage of students who are taught by an out-of-field teacher. (back to text)
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