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Visualizing Washington's Teacher Workforce
Understanding the trends impacting teacher recruitment and retention

Data Details

This page provides an overview of the data used to develop this website, definitions of key variables, and the analytic methodologies used to produce the maps.


Data Sources

All data for this website were obtained through two public datasets from the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI). State Report Card data downloaded from the OSPI website provided information about Washington’s student population, and S-275 Personnel Reporting data provided information about public school educators. This website used the following data aggregated to the school district level from 2011/12 through 2016/17:

State Report Card S-275 Personnel Reportingb
Number of students enrolled Number of certificated teachers
Number and percentage of students from each racial/ethnic group Number of beginning teachers
Number and percentage of economically disadvantaged studentsa Number of teachers continuing from the prior year
Number and percentage of students eligible for special education Number of teachers in each racial/ethnic group
Number and percentage of English learner students Salary, total and other
Number and percentage of migrant students Number of teachers with special education program code
Number and percentage of students meeting standard in English language arts, mathematics, and science assessments, by grade level and student group Number of teachers with English learner program code

aCommunity Eligibility Provision schools are listed on the OSPI Child Nutrition website and can be downloaded as Microsoft Excel files.
bSee the definitions below to learn how variables were reported in the S-275 Personnel Reporting data.


Definitions

Beginning teacher. A certificated teacher with a certificated assignment who is reported with fewer than 0.5 certificated years of experience (see CBRTN code “B” on page 36 of the S-275 Personnel Reporting manual).

Beginning teacher additional salary. The other salary (not base pay) of a beginning certificated teacher, as reported in the S-275 Personnel Reporting data (see page 102 of the S-275 Personnel Reporting manual for details).

Beginning teacher total salary. The total final salary of a beginning certificated teacher, as reported in the S-275 Personnel Reporting data (see page 83 of the S-275 Personnel Reporting manual for details).

Certificated teacher. A certificated employee with nonadministrative duty codes (codes 31–64 on pages 110–111 of the S-275 Personnel Reporting manual).

Continuing teacher. A certificated teacher who was reported by the district in the previous year, unless the person is a certificated employee with fewer than 0.5 certificated years of experience as of August 31 (see CBRTN code “C” on page 36 of the S-275 Personnel Reporting manual).

Community Eligibility Provision Districts. Districts in which all schools participate in the Community Eligibility Provision program from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. For details, see OSPI’s Child Nutrition website.

English language development teacher. A certificated teacher in a school district with program code 64 (Limited English Proficiency–Federal) or 65 (Transitional Bilingual–State).

English learner student. Count of current English learner students in a school district (students in the Transitional Bilingual Instructional Program) as reported in the State Report Card data.

Left teaching in the district. A certificated teacher who was teaching in the district in the prior year but is not teaching in the district in the current year, as determined by district codes in the S-275 Personnel Reporting data. This includes individuals who remained employed by the district but took a nonteaching assignment, individuals who left to teach in another district, individuals who had a gap of employment in the district for one or more school years, and individuals who were no longer employed in Washington public schools. An individual who taught in two districts in the same year and remained teaching in only one of them the following year would be coded as “left teaching in the district” for the district they no longer taught in and as “did not leave teaching in the district” for the district they continued teaching in.

Migrant student. Count of migrant students in a school district, as reported in the State Report Card data.

Proficiency rates on state assessments. Percentage of students meeting standard (scoring proficient or advanced) on state assessments, including the percentage of students who met standard on a previous test administration, as reported in the State Report Card data.

Special education teacher. A certificated teacher in a school district with a program code of 21 (Special Education–Supplemental–State), 22 (Special Education–Infants and Toddlers–State), 24 (Special Education–Supplemental–Federal), 25 (Special Education–Infants and Toddlers–Federal), 26 (Special Education–Institutions–State), or 29 (Special Education–Other–Federal).

Student race/ethnicity. The number and percentage of students in each racial/ethnic group, as reported in the State Report Card data.

Student who is economically disadvantaged. The number and percentage of students eligible for free or reduced-price meals, as reported in the State Report Card data.

Student with special needs. The number and percentage of students eligible for an individualized education program (IEP), as reported in the State Report Card data.

Teacher race/ethnicity. Teachers were coded as Hispanic if their Ethnicity Code in the S-275 Personnel Reporting data indicated they were Hispanic or Latino. Teacher race was determined by the Race Code variable in the S-275 Personnel Reporting data. Teachers with multiple race codes were coded as multiracial.

Methodology

This website reports data from public sources with minimal secondary analyses. District-level State Report Card data from 2011/12 through 2016/17 were appended to form longitudinal files. Individual-level data from the S-275 Personnel Reporting data were aggregated to the district level by calculating counts and averages of the variables defined above by district. State Report Card and S-275 Personnel Reporting data were merged, creating a unique file by district and school year. In addition to data fields taken directly from the public data, this website displays data for three types of calculated measures:

Average salary for beginning teachers. The mean value of the total final salary or other salary earned by beginning certificated teachers in a district.

Number of students per teacher. The number of students reported in a category of interest was divided by the number of teachers in a category of interest (for example, the number of Hispanic students in a district divided by the number of Hispanic teachers in that same district).

Percentage of teachers leaving the district. The number of teachers (overall or among a group of interest, such as beginning teachers) who left teaching in the district as defined above, divided by the number of teachers in the district the year they left (for example, the number of teachers who left the district after 2015/16, divided by the total number of teachers in the district during 2015/16).