The Teacher Follow–up Survey (TFS)

The purpose of the Teacher Follow-up Survey (TFS) is to determine how many teachers remained at the same school, moved to another school, or left the profession in the year following the Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) administration. The 2008-09 TFS was administered to a sample of teachers who completed the SASS in the previous year. The majority of the TFS is a web-based survey, but it also has paper component. The 2008-09 TFS is different from any previous TFS administration in that it also serves as the second wave of a longitudinal study of first-year teachers. Because of this, the 2008-09 TFS consists of four questionnaires. Two are for respondents who were first-year public school teachers in the 2007-08 SASS and two are for the remainder of the sample. Within those two groups, there is one questionnaire for teachers who left teaching since the previous SASS and another for those who are still currently teaching either in the same school as last year or in a different school. The topics for the Current Teacher questionnaire include teaching status and assignments, ratings of various aspects of teaching, information on decisions to change schools, and ratings of various strategies for retaining more teachers. The topics for the Former Teacher questionnaire include employment status, ratings of various aspects of teaching and their current jobs, and information on decisions to leave teaching. The questionnaires for each round of TFS are available online and can be downloaded from the Questionnaires page.