Horng, Eileen Lai. Poor Working Conditions Make Urban Schools Hard-to-Staff. University of California, n.d.
The author highlights the inequality in the access to qualified teachers that American students are experiencing. The disadvantaged groups, according to her, are the Hispanic, the Black, and the poor, who frequently live in problematic districts with low quality schools. It is challenging for the latter to attract and retain competent teachers due to their inability to provide comfortable working conditions; Horng actually sees the root cause of the problem in this fact. It would be relevant to note that she does not devalue the other factors that are known to demotivate qualified specialists, such as student demographics or salaries. She simply adds the lack of resources, safety, and support, which problems are observable in some schools, to the list of reasons why competent teachers are hardly willing to work for them.
The author makes the above conclusions from the study, which, in turn, rests on the outcomes of the online survey on the priorities that Californian teachers have in choosing a certain educational institution. The bias, therefore, is minimal, although the relatively narrow scope of the research is a quite serious limitation. Nevertheless, it provides a theoretical base for modeling the appropriate school policies and, consequently, recommending changes to the existing, which makes the article practically applicable. Specifically, it can improve the understanding of the conditions for which educational institutions should allow to be attractive for competent specialists. Thus, it offers sample school profiles that include both qualitative and quantitative data on the conditions that qualified teachers find more or less favorable. Those profiles can serve as framework for adjusting school policies, providing a clearer view of the necessary changes as well as the resources that reforms may require.
Work Cited
Horng, Eileen Lai. Poor Working Conditions Make Urban Schools Hard-to-Staff. University of California, n.d.