A review of state teacher policies: What are they, what are their effects, and what are their implications for school finance?

California and States across the nation are attempting to meet the challenge of staffing classrooms with high quality teachers. Each State has designed and implemented a web of policies targeted at teachers – from regulations on teacher education programs and certification to salary structures and recruitment and retention incentives. Despite the plethora of teacher policies, little is known about the variation in the specifics of the policies across States, their effects on teacher quality or student outcomes, or their implications for school finance. This study, seeks to fill some of these knowledge gaps by detailing and reviewing a large number of teacher policies across all fifty States and the District of Columbia. It also describes, more generally, what research tells us about teacher labor markets and promising approaches for strengthening the teacher workforce.