Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS)

1. Overview

The Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) is a survey of International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) Level 2¹ teachers and principals, which is equivalent to grades 7, 8 and 9 in the United States. The study is a collaborative effort of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and participating education systems. Representatives of each education system form the TALIS Board of Participating Countries, which sets policies and standards for the administration, analysis, and reporting of TALIS. Each education system administers TALIS according to the guidelines set by the TALIS Board of Participating Countries. In the United States, TALIS 2013 was conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) of the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education.

The initial administration of TALIS, in 2008, was the first large-scale international survey of the teaching workforce, the conditions of teaching, and the learning environments of schools in participating education systems. TALIS 2013 was the second administration. TALIS 2013 had 34 education systems participating, including the United States. The number increased to 38 in 2014 when four additional education systems decided to participate. The United States did not participate in TALIS 2008 and thus the United States administered TALIS for the first time in 2013.

Purpose

TALIS is part of the Indicators of Education Systems (INES) project, a project which was launched by OECD to help create a system of education indicators for cross-national comparisons for the use of policymakers, consumers, and private industry. TALIS has been designed to increase the international information available to OECD countries and a set of partner countries on teachers and the conditions under which they work. The overall objective of TALIS is to provide international indicators and policy-relevant analysis on teachers and their workplaces in order to help education systems develop and review policies that create the conditions for improved learning and spur further investigation into differences within and between education systems.

Components

TALIS consists of two instruments: a principal questionnaire and a teacher questionnaire. The 2013 principal questionnaire collects information on principal's personal background information, school background information, school climate, job satisfaction, school leadership, teacher appraisal and feedback, principal continuous professional development and teacher induction and mentoring. The 2013 teacher questionnaire collects information on teacher's background information, teacher continuous professional development, teacher appraisal and feedback, mentoring and induction, teaching practices, beliefs and attitudes, school climate, and job satisfaction. The questionnaires can be completed online or with paper-and-pencil.

Periodicity

Although TALIS was first administered internationally in 2008, the United States began participating in the second administration in 2013.

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