A growing number of studies indicate that teacher competence has a substantial effect on student achievement (Gustafsson, 2003; Wayne & Youngs, 2003; Nye, Konstantopoulus, & Hedges, 2004). It has been shown that formal teacher education is an important aspect of teacher competence (Barber & Mourshed, 2007). Results also indicate that the efficiency of teachers at least partly depends on subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge (Nye, Konstantopoulus & Hedges, 2004; Baumert et al., in press). In Sweden, as in many other countries, recruitment to teacher education has become an increasing problem during the last decades (Cooper & Alvarado, 2006; Högskoleverket, 2007). The low attractiveness of the teacher profession is in particular connected to an assumed deterioration of the quality of teacher education, to declining wages and to impaired working conditions (Björklund, Edin, Fredriksson & Kreuger, 2004; Fredriksson and Öckert (2007). Certain characteristics of effective teachers can be identified before they enter teaching (Barber & Mourshed, 2007). High knowledge levels in the areas of literacy and numeracy have been identified as important factors for future success in the teacher profession (Vegas, Murnane & Willett, 2001). However, little is known about the levels of achievement of students recruited into different teacher education programs and how this has changed over time. The main aim of the present study is to describe such differences for teacher education programs focusing on different levels of the school system and for teaching different subjects. Data comes from two databases. GOLD (Gothenburg Longitudinal Educational Database) is based on register data for all cohorts of 16-year-olds born from 1972 and onwards. For each individual there is a rich set of information concerning family background, school achievement in compulsory and upper secondary school, higher education, study finance, municipal adult education, the Swedish Scholastic Aptitude Test, employment, and income, among other things. The Teacher Register (TR) is a yearly updated register with information about all teachers employed in the Swedish compulsory and upper secondary school. There is, among other things, information about employment position, educational background, certification, and rate of employment.

The analyses will focus on characteristics of students entering into and graduating from teacher education programs, and to some extent also on those entering into the teacher profession, with particular attention to change over time. Given that the oldest persons for which we have data were born in 1972 we can cover a longer time period for those entering teacher education (1993-) than for those graduating and those who get employment as teachers (1997-). Comparisons will also be made with recruitment to some other educations (e. g., nursing, technology, law). In the analyses comparisons will be made between successive years and tests for trends will be made with regression analysis.

Though empirical results are not yet available an expected outcome is a fine-grained description of changes in levels of knowledge over time for entrants into, and graduates from, different types of teacher education. The analyses will in particular focus on characteristics which reflect levels of academic knowledge, as expressed in grades from compulsory and upper secondary school. We also will include gender and social background as characteristics to be analyzed.