This 2019-2024 NSF-funded Track 4 Noyce Collaborative Research project, was an exploratory study through a collaboration among Rice University (lead institution), the University of Rochester (DUE 1950001), Middle Tennessee State University (DUE 1949925), Southern Illinois University at Carbondale (DUE 1949969), University of Arizona (DUE 1950002), University of California-San Diego (DUE 1949985), University of Louisiana-Lafayette (DUE 1949927), and Kennesaw State University - all of which previously led Noyce Track 3 Master Teaching Fellows (MTF) projects. The purpose of this project was to study the retention and persistence of Noyce Master Teaching Fellows (MTFs) beyond their teaching commitment in relation to their motivation (self-efficacy for teaching), leadership engagement, diversity dispositions, social networks, and school-work environments.  We recruited 85 former participants in a Noyce MTF program in one of the above Universities between 2010-2020, and a comparable non-MTF group of 82 teachers with similar demographics, professional background, geographic region, etc.

We developed two instruments. The first instrument is a survey composed of Likert-scale items measuring teaching self-efficacy, teacher-school fit, leadership engagement, diversity dispositions, and community connections--representing structural, human, psychological, and social capitals of Mason and Matas' (2015) teacher retention model. The second instrument is a set of interview protocols to gather qualitative data on motivations behind teacher retention/mobility, leadership engagement, and teachers' social networks. These two instruments provide efficient, valid, and reliable ways for both researchers and practitioners to investigate teacher leadership and retention.

The survey administration included the 167 K-12 science and mathematics teachers, and the interview protocol was implemented with a subset of 66 of these teachers. To better understand issues of teacher retention and persistence, we placed each teacher into one of the following categories: stayer (actively teaching in the same school for the last few years), mover (actively teaching but recently changed schools), shifter (shifted from a teaching position to a non-teaching position), and leaver (left K-12 education) to randomly select subset of teachers from each cell for in-depth interviews. When investigating the connections between factors representing the four capitals (Mason & Matas, 2015) and retention, we merged movers into stayers and redefined stayers as "actively teaching regardless of changing schools." 

This research project produced more than 20 products including conference presentations and papers and journal manuscripts across all collaborating universities. One of the papers is about instrument validation that provides survey instruments and interview protocols that can be used by STEM teacher educators and researchers for program evaluation and research related to teacher retention and teacher leadership. This paper is currently under review in a preeminent peer-reviewed open access journal.


The second paper, the principal paper addressing the original research questions that drove this research project, has been accepted for publication in a major peer-reviewed international open access journal, International Journal of STEM Education. This paper presents important information that contributes to the field of STEM teacher education research. First, Noyce MTFs are found to have higher levels of teaching self-efficacy and more availing network attributes for both teaching networks and teacher leadership networks. These results demonstrate the positive impact of Noyce MTF programs. Second, the data indicated that Noyce MTFs are more likely to assume formal leadership and administrative roles in K-12 education and that they feel having a greater impact by assuming a formal leadership position than they use to have as individual classroom teachers. Third, we have interesting findings regarding the factors influencing retention. Leadership engagement was positively associated with shifting and teacher-school fit was negatively associated with leaving. MTF shifters had less experience on average than stayers. For elementary teachers, teaching self-efficacy was positively associated with shifting to a leadership position. Lastly, leadership network size, bridging, and geographic proximity variables were positively related to shifting when compared to staying as classroom teachers. 


Five research groups were formed to analyze the extensive quantitative and qualitative data collected in this project. Collaborating universities produced three more manuscripts that have been submitted or are being submitted to peer-reviewed journals. The results of these groups can be found on their project outcomes pages.

Five research groups were formed to analyze the extensive quantitative and qualitative data collected in this project. Collaborating universities produced three more manuscripts that have been submitted or are being submitted to peer-reviewed journals. The results of these groups can be found on their project outcomes pages.


The reactions from other researchers and faculty across the country and beyond during presentations of this research project at different outlets  have been positive and created a synergy among scholars in actively seeking to build on this research. For example, this research project partially informed the Western Noyce Region's research design. 

Last Modified: 12/04/2024
Modified by: Adem Ekmekci