Teacher quality stands out in the research for its potential to
close the gap in academic achievement between students from
traditionally poor, non-white, and/or urban backgrounds and
their better-off peers. This summary highlights the most salient
findings of the research on teacher quality. Good teachers have
a substantial effect on student achievement, especially when
assigned to work with disadvantaged students. - Teacher quality
more heavily influenced differences in student performance than
did race, class, or school of the student; disadvantaged
students benefited more from good teachers than did advantaged
students (Nye, Konstantopoulos, and Hedges 2004). - Achievement
gains from having an effective teacher could be almost three
times as large for African American students than for white
students, even when comparing students with the same prior
school achievement (Sanders and Rivers 1996). - The effects of
teacher quality accumulate over the years. Fifth-grade math
students in Tennessee who had three