In establishing the student performance standards and accountability provisions in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB, P.L. Thus, in enacting NCLB, Congress amended the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) to establish a requirement that all teachers be highly qualified and authorized the Title II, Teacher and Principal Training and Recruiting Fund to assist schools' efforts to meet this new requirement. Congress passed provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA, P.L. Nationwide, nearly 4 million teachers are employed in almost 100,000 public schools located in about 14,000 school districts. There are just under 3.9 million public school teachers in the United States. The teaching workforce is aging. Nearly two-fifths (19%) have less than four years of teaching experience and over a third (36%) have been in their current school less than four years. About 100,000 bachelor's degrees in education are awarded each year. Features of the Teaching Workplace

			Certification and Licensure

Teacher certification or licensure is a state function. Every state has a law addressing these issues that is specifically targeted to elementary and secondary school teachers. Since that time, funding for this purpose has increased roughly fivefold. Five other programs accounted for the remainder ($163 million) of ED's FY1998 funding to support K-12 teaching. Pre-service Training and Class Size Reduction

The 105 th Congress began a change in the focus of federal teacher policy through two measures: (1) amending the HEA to include a new Teacher Quality Enhancement program, and (2) appropriating funds for a new Class Size Reduction program under broad authority provided in Title VI of the ESEA. Effectiveness

Recently, Congress has signaled that, as opposed to continuing to emphasize teacher quality, increasingly federal policy may focus on teacher effectiveness. In November 2009, the Department of Education published a notice of final priorities for the Race to the Top program. Current Federal Teacher Programs

This section provides descriptions of the major federal programs currently authorized to address K-12 teaching. The primary focus of this discussion is on the programs in the ESEA as amended by NCLB. Among the authorized activities are the following: 
assistance to schools in the recruitment and retention of highly qualified teachers (see definition above), principals, and, under certain conditions, pupil services personnel; assistance in recruiting and hiring highly qualified teachers through such means as scholarships and signing bonuses; use of these teachers to reduce class sizes; initiatives to increase retention of highly qualified teachers and principals, particularly in schools with high percentages of low-achieving students, through mentoring, induction services during the initial three years of service, and financial incentives for those effectively serving all students; professional development, including professional development that involves technology in teaching and curriculum and professional development delivered through technology; improvement of the quality of the teaching force through such activities as tenure reform, merit pay, and teacher testing in their subject areas; and professional development for principals and superintendents. Teacher Quality Partnership Grants

Title II, Part A of the HEA authorizes Teacher Quality Partnership grants to improve the quality of teachers working in high-need schools and early childhood education programs by improving the preparation of teachers and enhancing professional development activities for teachers; holding teacher preparation programs accountable for preparing effective teachers; and recruiting highly qualified individuals into the teaching force. The second and third of these reform areas have particular importance for federal teacher policy. ESEA Reauthorization Issues

The authorization for ESEA programs expired at the end of FY2008, and the 113 th Congress is considering whether to amend and extend the ESEA. With the knowledge that these decisions are often made at the local level of our educational system, Congress may consider
whether the federal government will have a sustained role in teacher and principal compensation and whether this role will focus on seeding efforts to develop the capacity to link compensation to performance; whether performance-based teacher compensation efforts have triggered reforms in other areas such as evaluation procedures, leadership development, and data systems; whether successful reforms in a limited set of school districts can be replicated by scaling up the federal investment; and whether federal policy should address other barriers (i.e., beyond failure to identify poor teacher performance) that limit the role of teacher evaluations in high-stakes decision-making. Congress included similar provisions concerning the equitable distribution of teacher effectiveness in RTT.
The Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA) is the primary legislative vehicle for federal policymaking regarding teachers and instructional quality in the nation's elementary and secondary schools. Authorization for ESEA programs and policies, enacted through the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB), expired at the end of FY2008 and the 113th Congress is likely to consider whether to amend and extend the ESEA. Notable ESEA provisions concerning K-12 teaching include requirements for minimum teacher qualifications and authority for a teacher training and class size reduction program funded at roughly $3 billion.
The size of the teaching workforce and diversity of the teaching workplace present many challenges to federal policy makers. The workforce of roughly 4 million teachers in the United States is both aging and "greening"—with well over one-third (37%) on the job for over 15 years and an equal share (36%) having taught less than four years in their current school. The teaching workplace of about 14,000 school districts nationwide is a highly dynamic one—with certain schools experiencing high rates of staff turnover each year and many schools instituting major reforms of teacher evaluation procedures.
The federal role in K-12 teacher policy has evolved rapidly since passage of NCLB. Federal policy has historically focused mainly on in-service training (or professional development). This focus began to change as the 105th Congress tripled funding for federal teacher programs by enacting a hiring program known as Class Size Reduction. With NCLB, the focus of federal policy moved squarely to the issue of teacher quality. The law mandated that all "core" subject-matter teachers possess minimum qualifications including a bachelor's degree, full state certification, and subject-matter knowledge. More recently, the focus of federal policy in this area has shifted to teacher effectiveness, particularly with passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), which authorized the Race to the Top program. Legislative action in the 112th Congress, including bills passed by authorizing committees in both chambers, also contained provisions that would continue federal involvement in state and local efforts to evaluate teacher effectiveness.
At the present time, the Department of Education (ED) administers a dozen programs that support elementary and secondary school teachers and instructional quality. By far the largest of these, both in terms of appropriations and number of teachers served, is authorized in Part A of Title II of the ESEA—the Teacher and Principal Training and Recruiting Fund. In FY2013, this program provided roughly $3 billion primarily for teacher professional development to support meeting the NCLB highly qualified-teacher requirement. The second- and third-largest federal teacher programs are Race to the Top ($550 million in FY2013, though not all funds are used to improve teaching) and the Teacher Incentive Fund ($300 million in FY2013). Both of these programs support improved teacher effectiveness, the former through teacher evaluation reform and the latter by providing pay compensation to high-performing teachers.
If the 113th Congress considers reauthorizing the ESEA, teacher effectiveness will likely continue to be central to this discussion. Other issues of importance include compensation and high-stakes school staffing decision-making, distributional equity across schools and districts, teacher preparation programs—both traditional and alternative—and professional development.