National data on teachers are limited
to periodic sample surveys or to simple counts at the district or
school level. In response to the need for individual teacher-level
data, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) developed
the Teacher Compensation Survey (TCS), an administrative records
survey that collects total compensation, teacher status, and
demographic data about individual teachers from multiple state
education agencies (SEAs). In 2007, NCES launched the pilot TCS
data collection, with seven states volunteering to provide
administrative records for school year (SY) 200506. In the second
year of the data collection, the TCS expanded to 17 states
reporting SY 200607 data. The information collected from these
records included base salary, total salary, benefits, highest level
of education, years of teaching experience, gender, and
race/ethnicity for each teacher. The TCS file can be merged with
the Common Core of Data (CCD) Public Elementary/Secondary School
Universe Survey file to obtain such school information as school
type, operational status, locale code, number of students eligible
for free and reduced-price lunch, student enrollment by grade,
race/ethnicity, and gender, and pupil/teacher ratio. NCES will
continue to request data from more SEAs and to make the data more
comparable across them. It is anticipated that an average of 31
SEAs per year will volunteer to participate in the TCS between 2010
and 2013 (up to estimated thirty-five states in 2013).
On behalf of this Federal agency, I certify that
the collection of information encompassed by this request complies
with 5 CFR 1320.9 and the related provisions of 5 CFR
1320.8(b)(3).
The following is a summary of the topics, regarding
the proposed collection of information, that the certification
covers:
(i) Why the information is being collected;
(ii) Use of information;
(iii) Burden estimate;
(iv) Nature of response (voluntary, required for a
benefit, or mandatory);
(v) Nature and extent of confidentiality; and
(vi) Need to display currently valid OMB control
number;
If you are unable to certify compliance with any of
these provisions, identify the item by leaving the box unchecked
and explain the reason in the Supporting Statement.