Fattyacids
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In the debate about how to improve educational standards, the role of teachers is paramount. In fact, in recent years it's become a truism that attracting good quality and well-qualified people into teaching is accepted as the essential prerequisite to raising educational standards. In Finland and Singapore, teachers are recruited from the most-qualified graduates, all with a second degree.
One obvious way these countries have attracted the best and brightest into teaching is by paying them well. As I have established in my previous research, there is a demonstrable link between the level of teachers' salaries in a country and their educational track record. But the influence of teacher status – the social and cultural forces that determine how much we respect teachers – are harder to measure.
However, it is vital that we try and do so since the cleverest graduates, in demand from the best employers, will not want to join a profession that is publicly denigrated or seen as a second-best option for graduates. Governments that are serious about attracting the best people into teaching must look seriously at the status of teachers – alongside other factors such as their salaries.
There have been many international comparisons of educational performance such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). But teacher status has never been examined in any comprehensive way. It's common for people to remember a vanished age when teachers were respected, or feel that their own country alone has stopped giving teachers the respect they deserve. But until now there has been very little evidence to substantiate these perceptions.
The Varkey GEMS Foundation, aware of this gap, commissioned me to oversee the 2013 Global Teacher Status Index, the first large-scale international comparison of the status of teachers. Some 21,000 people were polled across 21 Asian, European, South American and Middle Eastern countries with the same questions. To gauge the social standing of teachers we asked people to rank teachers against other professions such as doctors, lawyers and librarians. We asked a question that goes to the heart of attitudes towards teachers: would you encourage your own child to become a teacher? We also asked how much, in a fair world, teacher should be paid. This survey evidence was then condensed into the index, with rankings for each of the 21 countries surveyed.
The results were not entirely predictable. Teachers had the highest status in China and Greece and the lowest in Israel and Brazil. Most European countries including the UK and the US ranked halfway down the index.
At least half of all people polled supported performance related pay for teachers. In two thirds of the countries surveyed, teachers were most likely to be compared to social workers. Interestingly, in the US teachers were most often compared to librarians – perhaps because libraries are located next to schools in many middle American towns. These comparisons show that there is a lot of progress to be made before teachers are thought of in the same bracket as lawyers and doctors.
But the starkest differences were between Eastern countries and the West. Apart from the sole exception of Greece, teachers in China, South Korea, Egypt, Turkey and Singapore had a higher status than every country surveyed in Europe and the US.
In European countries, between 10 and 25% of people tended to think that pupils respected teachers – compared to 75% in China. Fewer than 20% of Germans would encourage their child to become a teacher compared to nearly 50% of Chinese people. Out of all the countries surveyed, only Chinese people tended to compare teachers with doctors. Here, cultural issues seem to be at work. Teaching is treated with reverence in Asian societies – especially in China.
By publishing the 2013 Global Teacher Status Index, we hope to encourage such debates – from education ministries to staff rooms – about how we bring about the transformation in teacher status that the next generation need, and teachers themselves deserve.
Peter Dolton is professor of economics at Sussex University and a senior research fellow at the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics. He is co-author of the Varkey GEMS 2013 Global Teacher Status Index, published on Thursday.
One obvious way these countries have attracted the best and brightest into teaching is by paying them well. As I have established in my previous research, there is a demonstrable link between the level of teachers' salaries in a country and their educational track record. But the influence of teacher status – the social and cultural forces that determine how much we respect teachers – are harder to measure.
However, it is vital that we try and do so since the cleverest graduates, in demand from the best employers, will not want to join a profession that is publicly denigrated or seen as a second-best option for graduates. Governments that are serious about attracting the best people into teaching must look seriously at the status of teachers – alongside other factors such as their salaries.
There have been many international comparisons of educational performance such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). But teacher status has never been examined in any comprehensive way. It's common for people to remember a vanished age when teachers were respected, or feel that their own country alone has stopped giving teachers the respect they deserve. But until now there has been very little evidence to substantiate these perceptions.
The Varkey GEMS Foundation, aware of this gap, commissioned me to oversee the 2013 Global Teacher Status Index, the first large-scale international comparison of the status of teachers. Some 21,000 people were polled across 21 Asian, European, South American and Middle Eastern countries with the same questions. To gauge the social standing of teachers we asked people to rank teachers against other professions such as doctors, lawyers and librarians. We asked a question that goes to the heart of attitudes towards teachers: would you encourage your own child to become a teacher? We also asked how much, in a fair world, teacher should be paid. This survey evidence was then condensed into the index, with rankings for each of the 21 countries surveyed.
The results were not entirely predictable. Teachers had the highest status in China and Greece and the lowest in Israel and Brazil. Most European countries including the UK and the US ranked halfway down the index.
At least half of all people polled supported performance related pay for teachers. In two thirds of the countries surveyed, teachers were most likely to be compared to social workers. Interestingly, in the US teachers were most often compared to librarians – perhaps because libraries are located next to schools in many middle American towns. These comparisons show that there is a lot of progress to be made before teachers are thought of in the same bracket as lawyers and doctors.
But the starkest differences were between Eastern countries and the West. Apart from the sole exception of Greece, teachers in China, South Korea, Egypt, Turkey and Singapore had a higher status than every country surveyed in Europe and the US.
In European countries, between 10 and 25% of people tended to think that pupils respected teachers – compared to 75% in China. Fewer than 20% of Germans would encourage their child to become a teacher compared to nearly 50% of Chinese people. Out of all the countries surveyed, only Chinese people tended to compare teachers with doctors. Here, cultural issues seem to be at work. Teaching is treated with reverence in Asian societies – especially in China.
By publishing the 2013 Global Teacher Status Index, we hope to encourage such debates – from education ministries to staff rooms – about how we bring about the transformation in teacher status that the next generation need, and teachers themselves deserve.
Peter Dolton is professor of economics at Sussex University and a senior research fellow at the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics. He is co-author of the Varkey GEMS 2013 Global Teacher Status Index, published on Thursday.
