The quality of teaching received by students has the greatest impact on their education outcomes outside the impact of individual and family characteristics (Hanushek, 1992; Wright, et al., 1997; Hanushek, et al., 1998; Hanushek, et al., 2005; Leigh, 2010). From a policy perspective, improving the quality of teachers and their teaching in schools is the most effective method to improve student outcomes (Leigh, 2010).

The effectiveness of teachers new to the profession is an important policy issue given the impact of teachers on student learning. However, greater experience in front of a classroom is often considered important to develop the skills required for effective teaching (OECD, 2005). Nevertheless, an effective school education system requires new teachers to provide high-quality education to students (OECD, 2009).

This work analyzes key aspects of teachers’ work experience to inform policy development aimed at increasing the effectiveness of new teachers. The paper is structured around four key policy issues: 1) New teachers and the schools in which they work, 2) Support and development initiatives for new teachers, 3) The work of new teachers, 4) The efficacy of new teachers. Comparisons are made between new and more experienced teachers – new teachers defined as having two years or less of teaching experience. In this way, our main objective is to identify significant differences between new and experienced teachers related to the policy issues mentioned above, and discuss its policy implications.

The data analyzed stems from the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) 2008 carried out by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 24 countries to collect information regarding the lower secondary education teachers and their working conditions. The analysis includes 23countries participating in TALIS 2008 (Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Republic of Korea, Lithuania, Malta, Malaysia, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Slovak Republic, Slovenia and Turkey).

These areas have been analysed because they are important to policy makers and are suitable issues to be analysed with the TALIS 2008 dataset.

Hanushek, E. (1992), "The Trade-off between Child Quantity and Quality", Journal of Political Economy”, Vol. 100, pp. 84-117. Hanushek, E., et al., (1998), “Teachers, Schools and Academic Achievement”, Cambridge, MA, NBER Working Paper Series, No. 6691. Hanushek, E., et al. (2005), “The Market for Teacher Quality”, Cambridge, MA, NBER Working Paper Series, No. 11154. Leigh, A. (2010), "Estimating Teacher Effectiveness from two-year Changes in Students’ Test Scores", Economics of Education Review, No. 29, pp. 480-488. OECD (2009), Creating Effective Teaching and Learning Environments: First Results from TALIS, Paris. OECD (2005), Teachers Matter: Attracting, developing and retaining effective teachers, OECD, Paris. Wright, S. P., S. P. Horn, et al. (1997), "Teacher and Classroom Context Effects on Student Achievement: Implications for Teacher Evaluation", Journal of Personnel Evaluation in Education, No. 11, pp. 57-67.