Frequent staff changes linked to lower learning progress in primary education

Primary school pupils learn the most when their teacher has been employed by the school for a lengthy period. High staff turnover, on the other hand, is detrimental to the children.

To reach their conclusion, researchers from the Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis (CPB) looked at what they refer to as the learning gains of children. With this, they looked into how the children performed in school at the end of group 7, which is considered an important benchmark, but they also looked at their levels when they were in group 3. During the period in between, teachers assess children’s skills in arithmetic, spelling, and reading comprehension ten times.

This development shows what a school has been able to teach the child. There are also schools “where pupils may achieve satisfactory scores, but show little progress.”

The study shows that learning gains are lower “when teachers or school leaders switch schools more frequently.” At such schools, “a larger share of the staff is new.” The research does not delve further into the reasons behind this.

According to the study, there is a connection between the education level and the parents’ income with regard to the development of a child at primary school. If the parents have studied at higher education levels, which is a university or hbo, then their children often end up at good schools. These children are also more often subject to extra lessons, like tutoring.

The children in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, Utrecht, and Almere often begin the year with slightly lower scores. By the end of primary school, however, the gap with pupils in the rest of the country has been closed. The learning gains in the five cities are therefore slightly higher.