Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Research frequently reveals teacher quality to be an essential element of education quality. Efforts to recruit good teachers have focused on two sets of rewards to the profession: "noble" rewards that emphasize the benefits to children and communities, and more extrinsic rewards, such as good benefits and convenient schedules. This experiment randomly assigned college-age participants to prompts extolling the various benefits of becoming a teacher. Those who were presented with noble rewards expressed greater interest in entering the profession than did those who were exposed to more extrinisic or no rewards, but the strength of this effect varied by gender and race. These results suggest that efforts to recruit talented individuals into teacher preparation programs should emphasize the benefits to the community and the students, not simply to the teacher.