Luke Miller

The Virginia Department of Education and the University of Virginia will examine student equity of access to instructional opportunities and educational outcomes and describe how Virginia's responses to COVID-19 may have influenced equity in student outcomes and differences in teacher outcomes across student characteristics.

In order to close persistent achievement gaps along lines of race and ethnicity and economic disadvantaged status, all students must be taught by an effective teacher. Improving working conditions can help accomplish that because these conditions define the school context in which teachers do their work and facilitate teachers realizing the intrinsic rewards they seek. This project will explore the relationships between working conditions, teacher retention, and equitable student outcomes.

This project supported the Virginia Department of Education's (VDOE) efforts to systematically measure school climate and working conditions, provide targeted technical assistance to schools to improve their school climate and working conditions concerns, and incorporate school climate metrics into Virginia's school accountability system in order to help VDOE gain a better understanding of how school climate is related to student education outcomes.