Study of the Teacher Education 

Assistance for College and Higher 

Education (TEACH) Grant Program

Study of the Teacher Education 

Assistance for College and Higher 

Education (TEACH) Grant Program

March 2018 

Prepared for:

U.S. Department of Education

Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development

Policy and Program Studies Service

Prepared by:

Elizabeth Barkowski 

Evan Nielsen

HarmoniJoie Noel

Melissa Dodson

Kathy Sonnenfeld

Cong Ye

Elizabeth DeMonte

Brianne Monahan

Megan Eccleston

American Institutes for Research
This report was produced under U.S. Department of Education Contract No. EDPEP-11-O-0089/Task 

Order 30 with American Institutes for Research. Brian Fu served as the contracting officer’s 

representative. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent the positions or policies of the 

U.S. Department of Education. No official endorsement by the U.S. Department of Education of any 

product, commodity, service, or enterprise mentioned in this publication is intended or should be 

inferred.

U.S. Department of Education

Betsy DeVos

Secretary

Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development

Frank Brogan

Delegated Duties of Assistant Secretary

Policy and Program Studies Service

Victoria Hammer

Acting Director

March 2018

This report is in the public domain. Authorization to reproduce it in whole or in part is granted. While 

permission to reprint this publication is not necessary, the citation should be: U.S. Department of 

Education, Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development, Policy and Program Studies Service, 

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program,

Washington, DC, 2018. 

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Content Contact:

Brian Fu

202-260-1467

brian.fu@ed.gov
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

iii

Contents

List of Exhibits....................................................................................................................................v

Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................................xi

Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................xiii

TEACH Grant Recipient Views and Outcomes ...............................................................................xiv

Recipient Factors Associated with Not Meeting the TEACH Grant Requirements............................. xv

Institutional Administration of TEACH Grants...............................................................................xvi

Study Limitations ..........................................................................................................................xvii

Introduction ................................................................................................................................1

Study Research Questions ...............................................................................................................2

Data Sources....................................................................................................................................2

Sample Selection, Data Collection Activities, and Analysis Methods..............................................3

Study Limitations .............................................................................................................................6

TEACH Grant Recipient Views and Outcomes................................................................................7

Key Findings.....................................................................................................................................7

Influence of TEACH Grant on Student Decisions to Pursue Teaching..............................................7

Likelihood of Meeting the Grant Requirements..............................................................................8

Conversion Rates from Grants to Loans........................................................................................10

Chapter Summary ..........................................................................................................................11

Recipient Factors Associated with Not Meeting the TEACH Grant Requirements..........................13

Key Findings...................................................................................................................................13

Factors Associated with Recipients Not Meeting the TEACH Grant Requirements..........................14

Recipient Understanding of Program Requirements.....................................................................16

Institution Perspective on Reasons for Grant-to-Loan Conversion...............................................19

Recipient Characteristics Associated with Grant-to-Loan Conversions.........................................20

Timing of When Recipients Receive TEACH Grants.......................................................................22

Chapter Summary ..........................................................................................................................23

Institutional Administration of TEACH Grants .............................................................................25

Key Findings...................................................................................................................................25

Institutional Goals for Use of TEACH Grants..................................................................................25

Institution Staff Roles Related to TEACH Grant Implementation ..................................................26

Promoting Awareness of the TEACH Grant ...................................................................................28

Counseling......................................................................................................................................30

Prevalence of Institutional Practices Associated with Lower Grant-to-Loan Conversion Rates ...33

How Grants Relate to Federal Annual Loan Limits........................................................................36
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Field and Job Placement Services..................................................................................................36

Chapter Summary ..........................................................................................................................38

Summary of Findings........................................................................................................................39

References.......................................................................................................................................41

Appendix A. Institutions of Higher Education and Recipient Data Tables............................................43

Appendix B. Case Study Narratives...................................................................................................59

Appendix C. Data Sources, Data Collection Activities, Data Processing, and Analysis Methods ...........77

Data Sources..................................................................................................................................77

Data Collection Activities...............................................................................................................84

Data Processing..............................................................................................................................89

Analysis Methods...........................................................................................................................96

Appendix D. Data Collection Instruments .......................................................................................103
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

v 

Exhibits 

Exhibit 1. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how influential the TEACH 

Grant was as an incentive to pursue teaching as a career or to pursue teaching in 

a high-need field and school................................................................................................. 8

Exhibit 2. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients’ likelihood of fulfilling the service

requirements at the time of receiving their first TEACH Grant, by grant-to-loan 

conversion status.................................................................................................................. 9

Exhibit 3. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients’ likelihood of fulfilling the service 

requirements at the time of survey completion, by loan conversion status...................... 10

Exhibit 4. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status......................................... 11

Exhibit 5. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients in loan status who reported factors that 

influenced their not fulfilling the service requirements..................................................... 14

Exhibit 6. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients in loan status who reported the reason 

they are teaching in a nonqualifying position .................................................................... 16

Exhibit 7. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how well informed they 

were about the four-year service requirement to teach in a qualifying high-need 

field and school, during the process of obtaining their first TEACH Grant, by loan 

conversion status................................................................................................................ 17

Exhibit 8. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how well informed they 

were about the requirement to annually certify their intent to teach in a highneed field and school, after leaving their teacher preparation program, by loan 

conversion status................................................................................................................ 18

Exhibit 9. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how well informed they 

were about determining whether a specific teaching position qualified under the 

TEACH Grant ....................................................................................................................... 19

Exhibit 10. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status, by academic level, 

gender, first generation status, federal loan borrower status, and Pell Grant 

status................................................................................................................................... 21

Exhibit 11. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status, by academic level 

after receiving first TEACH Grant........................................................................................ 22

Exhibit 12. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status, by institutional 

sector .................................................................................................................................. 22
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 13. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who were accepted and admitted into a 

teacher preparation program prior to or after receiving their first TEACH Grant.............. 23

Exhibit 14. Percentage of institutions of higher education reporting certain institutional goals 

for the use of TEACH Grants............................................................................................... 26

Exhibit 15. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department with the 

lead oversight for TEACH Grant administration ................................................................. 27

Exhibit 16. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department that 

informs students about the TEACH Grant .......................................................................... 28

Exhibit 17. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients, by information source from which 

recipients first learned about the TEACH Grant ................................................................. 29

Exhibit 18. Percentage of institutions of higher education that used various modes of 

communication to inform students about the TEACH Grant ............................................. 30

Exhibit 19. Percentage of institutions that provided integrated mandatory or optional 

counseling either in-person or online by office or department ......................................... 31

Exhibit 20. Percentage of institutions that provided stand-alone mandatory or optional 

counseling either in-person or online by office or department ......................................... 31

Exhibit 21. Percentage of institutions of higher education offering TEACH Grant counseling, 

by type of counseling provided........................................................................................... 32

Exhibit 22. Variation in grant-to-loan conversion rates by reported use of various 

institutional practices ......................................................................................................... 34

Exhibit 23. Percentage of institutions of higher education that reported using various 

practices.............................................................................................................................. 35

Exhibit 24. Percentage of institutions of higher education that reported providing various 

types of placement services for positions that qualify for TEACH Grant 

requirements, by office or department.............................................................................. 37

Exhibit A1.1a. Percentage of institutions of higher education reporting certain institutional goals 

for the use of TEACH Grants............................................................................................... 43

Exhibit A1.1b. Percentage of institutions of higher education reporting the level of influence of 

TEACH Grants on student decisions.................................................................................... 43

Exhibit A1.2a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department and by the 

modes of communication that institutions use to inform students about the TEACH 

Grant.................................................................................................................................... 44
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Exhibit A1.2b. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department that 

inform students about the TEACH Grant............................................................................ 44

Exhibit A1.2c. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients, by 

information source from which recipients first learned about the TEACH Grant 

and by loan conversion status ............................................................................................ 45

Exhibit A1.3a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department with the 

lead oversight for TEACH Grant administration ................................................................. 45

Exhibit A1.4a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by the types of TEACH Grant 

integrated counseling provided and by office or department ........................................... 46

Exhibit A1.4b. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by the types of TEACH Grant 

stand-alone counseling provided and by office or department......................................... 46

Exhibit A1.5a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by the types of placement services 

provided for qualifying TEACH Grant service positions and by office 

or department..................................................................................................................... 47

Exhibit A1.6a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

were accepted and admitted into a teacher preparation program prior to or after 

receiving their first TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status............................................. 47

Exhibit A2.1a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported how well Informed they were about the requirement to annually certify 

their intent to teach in a high-need field at a high-need school, on leaving their 

teacher preparation program, by loan conversion status.................................................. 48

Exhibit A2.1b. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported how well informed they were about the four-year service requirement 

to teach in a qualifying high-need field at a high-need school, during the process 

of obtaining their first TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status........................................ 48

Exhibit A2.1c. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported how well informed they were about determining whether a specific 

teaching position qualified for TEACH Grant service, on leaving their teacher 

preparation program, by loan conversion status ............................................................... 49

Exhibit A2.2a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported the likelihood of fulfilling the TEACH Grant four-year service 

requirement to teach in a qualifying high-need field at a high-need school, upon 

receipt of their first TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status............................................ 49
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit A2.2b. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported the likelihood of fulfilling the TEACH Grant four-year service 

requirement in a qualifying high-need field at a high-need school, at the time of 

survey completion, by loan conversion status ................................................................... 50

Exhibit A2.2c. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported factors that influenced their likelihood of completing the service 

requirements, at the time of survey completion, by loan conversion status..................... 50

Exhibit A2.2d. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients whose 

grants were converted to loans and who reported the reason they did not certify 

annually ............................................................................................................................... 51

Exhibit A2.2e. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients in 

loan status who reported the reason they are teaching in a nonqualifying position ........ 51

Exhibit A2.2f. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients 

whose grants converted to loans who reported factors that influenced their 

likelihood of completing the service requirements at the time of survey 

completion, by whether not certifying annually was a factor in conversion ..................... 52

Exhibit A2.3a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported how influential the TEACH Grant was as an incentive to pursue teaching 

as a career or teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school .................................... 53

Exhibit A3.1a. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher 

education, by criteria used to limit eligibility of students to receive TEACH Grants.......... 54

Exhibit A3.1b. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher 

education, by the modes of communication that institutions use to inform 

students about the TEACH Grant........................................................................................ 55

Exhibit A3.1c. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher 

education, by the type of TEACH Grant counseling provided ............................................ 55

Exhibit A3.1d. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher 

education, by the types of placement services provided for qualifying TEACH 

Grant service positions ....................................................................................................... 56

Exhibit A4. Grant-to-loan conversion rates for all TEACH Grant recipients by gender, first 

generation status, federal loan borrower status, Pell Grant status, academic level, 

and institutional sector....................................................................................................... 57

Exhibit C1. Number and percentage of survey sample frame, by strata: TEACH Grant 

Recipient Survey ................................................................................................................. 80
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Exhibit C2. Number and percentage of selected survey sample, by strata: TEACH Grant 

Recipient Survey ................................................................................................................. 81

Exhibit C3. Case study institutions, by geographic region, sector, number of recipients, grantto-loan conversion rates, distance learning, and freshmen and sophomores 

receiving grants (2009–2014) .............................................................................................. 83

Exhibit C4. Number of sample members receiving survey contact attempts, number of 

sample members responding after each contact attempt, and the cumulative 

response rate after each contact attempt: IHE Survey....................................................... 85

Exhibit C5. Number of sample members receiving survey contact attempts, number of 

sample members responding after each contact attempt, and the cumulative 

response rate after each contact attempt, by grant-to-loan conversion strata: 

Recipient Survey ................................................................................................................. 86

Exhibit C6. Number of interviews by protocol type and institution..................................................... 88

Exhibit C7. Mean distribution of the frame variables for the selected sample, the respondent 

sample, and bias: IHE Survey .............................................................................................. 93

Exhibit C8. Distribution of the frame variables for the selected sample, the respondent 

sample, and bias: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey............................................................... 94

Exhibit C9. Preliminary codes and code definitions............................................................................ 100

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Acknowledgments

We wish to thank several people who contributed to the completion of this study.

We are grateful for the faculty and staff at the institutions of higher education who were the subjects of 

this study for their kind cooperation and assistance in completing surveys and participating in 

interviews, which provided the data for this study. Without their participation, this report would not 

have been possible, and we deeply appreciate their assistance. 

We would like to acknowledge the thoughtful contributions of the members of our Technical Working 

Group, including Mark LeCelle-Peterson, American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education; Karen 

McCarthy, National Association of Student Financial Aid Administration; Robert Muller, National Louis 

University; Melissa Pizzo, Arizona State University; and Dan Player, University of Virginia. 

Many additional staff of American Institutes for Research assisted with this report. Specifically, we would 

like to thank Kerstin Le Floch, Sandy Eyster, Anne Diffenderffer, Helen Duffy, Meredith Ludwig, Andrew 

Wayne, Alexandra Hickling, Marian Eaton, Michael Jackson, Jingyan Xia, Yan Wang, and our Publications 

team. We also recognize the assistance of Charles Coble and Michael Allen and the staff from Teacher 

Preparation Analytics for their assistance with interview protocol development and site visits.

Thanks also to the National Student Loan Data System team and the Pennsylvania Higher Education 

Assistance Agency servicing team for their support in providing administrative data.

Although we appreciate the assistance and support of all the above individuals, any errors in judgment 

or fact are, of course, the responsibility of the authors.

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

xiii

Executive Summary

There is a shortage of highly qualified individuals teaching in high-need fields and schools in the United 

States (U.S. Department of Education 2016b). The U.S. Department of Education’s Teacher Education 

Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant aims to increase the number of teachers in 

high-need fields and schools by providing up to $4,000 per year to undergraduate and graduate students 

enrolling in coursework to become a teacher. To meet the requirements of the TEACH Grant, recipients 

must teach in a high-need field1 such as reading specialist, mathematics, or science, at a high-need

school,

2 for at least four years in an eight-year period and annually certify that they intend to meet this 

requirement. If a recipient does not meet the grant requirements or the annual certification 

requirements, the grant converts to an unsubsidized loan (U.S. Department of Education 2016a). 

A 2015 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that large numbers of TEACH Grant 

recipients did not meet the grant requirements (GAO 2015). Similarly, using extant data from the loan 

servicer, this study found that 63 percent of the recipients who began their service obligation period 

prior to July 2014 converted a TEACH Grant to an unsubsidized loan prior to June 2016. Other research 

on physician loan forgiveness and service scholarship programs suggests that when the financial benefit 

offsets the cost of professional preparation, these programs can successfully recruit and retain highquality professionals into fields and communities where they are most needed. However, studies also 

have found that programs that provide small amounts are not effective when the financial benefit does 

not offset the cost of professional preparation (Podolsky and Kini 2016). 

The purpose of this study was to answer three main questions:

1. How do TEACH Grant recipients view grant requirements and to what extent do recipients 

fulfill those requirements?

2. What factors are associated with TEACH Grant recipients not meeting the grant 

requirements?

3. How do institutions of higher education administer TEACH Grants and support grant 

recipients?

This study was conducted in 2016 and included a survey of institutions of higher education, a survey of 

grant recipients, interviews with institution staff, federal student aid data, and institutional data 

obtained from the loan servicer. 

In this report, we initially present the key findings across the study as a whole; then we present the key 

findings from the three research questions. For this report, grant recipients who left school and continue 

to satisfy the certification requirements or have successfully completed the four-year teaching 

 

1 This definition of high-need field comes from the list of service requirements for the TEACH Grant: 

https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/types/grants-scholarships/teach#high-need-fields. 

2 Defined by the U.S. Department of Education as a public or other nonprofit private elementary or secondary school with 

more than 30 percent of the school’s enrollment counted as meeting a measure of poverty under Section 1113(a)(f) Title I of 

the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA). This report will use high-need school instead of low-income 

school. This definition of low-income school comes from U.S. Department of Education Teacher Cancellation Low Income 

Directory Web site for Federal Student Aid: https://tcli.ed.gov/CBSWebApp/tcli/. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

xiv

commitment are referred to as “recipients in grant status,” and recipients who did not meet the 

requirements and whose grants converted to loans are referred to as “recipients in loan status.”

Top Key Findings

• More than half (58 percent) of the TEACH Grant recipients said the TEACH Grant was 

somewhat or very influential in their decisions to pursue teaching in a high-need field at a 

high-need school.

• When TEACH Grant recipients first received their grants, 89 percent thought they were likely 

or very likely to fulfill the service requirements, but at the time of the survey, 63 percent had 

their grants converted to a loan because they had not met the service requirements or the 

annual certification requirements. 

• Recipients who did not meet grants requirements reported both employment-related factors 

such as teaching in a position that did not qualify as TEACH Grant service as well as processrelated factors such as not understanding the service requirements and not knowing about 

the annual certification requirement. 

• Institutions were more likely to report using TEACH Grants to make higher education more 

affordable for students than to encourage students to pursue teaching in a high-need field at 

a high-need school.

• If TEACH Grants were counted against the federal annual loan limit, 42 percent of students 

who received TEACH Grants in 2013–14 would have exceeded that limit. 

• Seventy percent of institutions provided students with placement services for qualifying 

TEACH Grant service positions. 

TEACH Grant Recipient Views and Outcomes

While many TEACH Grant recipients reported that they initially thought they were likely to fulfill grant 

requirements and that the grant was influential on their career decisions, the majority of recipients 

ultimately did not meet those requirements.

Almost half (44 percent) of the TEACH Grant recipients said that the TEACH Grant was 

somewhat or very influential in their decisions to pursue teaching as a career, and 

58 percent said the TEACH Grant was somewhat or very influential in their decisions to 

pursue teaching in a high‐need field at a high-need school. 

Thirty-three percent of the recipients said that the grants were not at all influential on their decisions to 

pursue teaching as a career. Nineteen percent of the recipients said that the grants were not at all 

influential on their decisions to pursue teaching in a high-need field and school.

Eighty-nine percent of the TEACH Grant recipients thought they were likely or very likely 

to fulfill the service requirements when they first received their grant. 

Recipients who eventually had their grants converted to loans retrospectively reported being less likely 

to meet the service requirements when they first received their grant. Specifically, among the recipients 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

xv

whose grants converted to loans, 86 percent indicated that after receiving their first grant, they initially 

thought they were likely or very likely to fulfill the four-year service requirement to teach in a qualifying 

high-need field at a high-need school. Among recipients in grant status, 94 percent indicated that they 

had thought they were likely or very likely to fulfill the four-year service requirements. 

Among TEACH Grant recipients who began their eight-year service obligation period prior 

to July 2014, 63 percent had their grants converted to an unsubsidized loan because they 

did not meet the service requirements or the annual certification requirements as of 

June 2016. 

Using extant data for the entire population of recipients, this grant-to-loan conversion rate was derived 

by first calculating the cumulative, total number of recipients who had begun their service obligation 

period prior to July 1, 2014. Then the number of those recipients for whom at least one grant had been 

converted to a loan was divided by the total to obtain the conversion rate. Among the remaining, 

6 percent had completed the service requirements, and 31 percent had grants requiring service.

Recipient Factors Associated with Not Meeting

the TEACH Grant Requirements

Results from the recipient survey provide insights on employment and process factors associated with 

recipients not meeting the grant requirements. In addition, administrative data shed light on recipient 

characteristics that are associated with not meeting the grant requirements. Most respondents who 

were in loan status identified factors as influencing their not completing the grant requirements. These 

factors fall into three broad categories: factors related to employment relate to situations that affect 

whether recipients obtain positions that qualify for grant service, factors related to understanding the 

service requirements include situations in which recipients did not understand the requirements to 

complete grant service, and factors related to annual certification pertain to the administrative process 

by which recipients maintain their grant status.

Factors related to employment that are influential to not completing the service 

requirements, as reported at the time of survey completion by grant recipients in loan 

status, included teaching in a position that did not qualify for TEACH Grant service 

(39 percent) and not working as a certified teacher (33 percent).

Thirty-two percent of the recipients in loan status reported not understanding the service 

requirements as being influential to not completing those requirements.

Factors related to annual certification that are influential to not completing the service 

requirements, as reported at the time of survey completion by grant recipients in loan 

status, included not certifying because they did not know about the annual certification 

process (19 percent) and not certifying because of challenges related to the certification 

process (13 percent). 

Nine percent of the recipients in loan status reported that forgetting about annual certification was a 

factor influential to not completing the service requirements. Twenty-four percent reported other 

factors such as never being certain of intention to teach and changing to a nonteaching, administrative 

position at a school (e.g., promotion to principal) prior to fulfilling their service. Reasons related to
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

xvi

recipients currently not teaching included not continuing in a teacher preparation program, not 

graduating, not completing the teaching degree or certificate, and leaving the profession after 

graduating or teaching. 

TEACH Grant recipients who were in loan status were less likely than those who were in 

grant status to say they were well informed about the service requirements during the 

process of obtaining their first grant (39 percent and 65 percent, respectively). 

Reports of being well informed about the service requirements varied based on whether the recipient 

had a grant converted to a loan or not. Among recipients whose grants converted to loans, 35 percent 

indicated they were somewhat or not informed about the service requirements during the process of 

obtaining their first grant compared with 13 percent of the recipients in grant status. 

Grant-to-loan conversion rates were higher among males, students with federal loans, and 

Pell Grant recipients. 

For example, among the TEACH Grant recipients who began their service obligation period before July 1, 

2014, 66 percent who were Pell Grant recipients3 had a grant converted to a loan versus 58 percent of 

those who were not Pell Grant recipients.

Institutional Administration of TEACH Grants

Institutions are responsible for implementing aspects of the TEACH Grant program, including awarding 

the grants, counseling recipients, and in many cases assisting recipients in securing teaching positions 

that qualify for grant service. Results from the survey of institutions provide insights into how 

institutions view and administer these grants.

Almost half (49 percent) of the institutions reported using TEACH Grants to encourage 

students to pursue teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school, and nearly all 

(92 percent) institutions reported using TEACH Grants to make higher education more 

affordable for students.

In describing institutional goals for using TEACH Grants, institutions were more likely to report making 

higher education more affordable for students than encouraging students to pursue teaching in a highneed field at a high-need school. 

Within higher education institutions, TEACH Grants were primarily overseen by financial 

aid office staff rather than college of education staff. 

Ninety-three percent of the IHE Survey respondents indicated that the financial aid office led oversight 

of the grant, whereas 7 percent indicated that other departments, such as the college of education, led 

oversight. 

 

3 The federal Pell Grant program provides need-based grants to low-income undergraduate and certain postbaccalaureate 

students to promote access to postsecondary education.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

xvii

For 42 percent of the students who received TEACH Grants in 2013–14, the sum of their 

TEACH Grants and federal loans in that year exceeded the federal annual loan limit.

Federal loan limits exist to protect students from excessive borrowing. In comparing the sum of each 

recipient’s TEACH Grant funds and Stafford loan funds disbursed in 2013–14 with the recipient’s 

estimated federal 2013–14 annual loan limit, 42 percent of the grant recipients would have borrowed 

more than their federal annual loan limit if their grants were considered loans.

In an examination of common TEACH Grant administrative practices, 70 percent of the 

institutions provided students with placement services for qualifying TEACH Grant 

service positions.

More than half of participating institutions reported providing guidance to students on how to identify 

teaching positions that would qualify under the grant requirements (58 percent). Fewer institutions 

indicated that they provided updated lists of available positions to students (48 percent) or established 

relationships with elementary and secondary schools that have eligible positions (46 percent). Colleges 

of education typically were responsible for providing the placement services.

Study Limitations

Readers should note some limits to the interpretation and generalizability of the study findings. 

Some under-coverage of the target population exists in the extant data and recipient survey sample 

frame. For example, due to the July 2013 transition in federal loan servicer for the TEACH Grant, the 

current servicer does not possess records for some recipients who either converted grants to loans or 

completed service prior to the transition. As a result, these recipients, representing about 6 percent of 

the recipients in the target population, are not accounted for in conversion rate calculations and were 

not included in the sampling frame.

A significant number of recipients in loan status (32 percent) responded to a question about the 

likelihood of completing the grant requirements by selecting categories that indicated they had already 

completed the requirements or were likely to do so. The inconsistency of these responses with their 

administrative status may have been a result of respondents misunderstanding the question in the way 

the item was worded and structured, misunderstanding the current status of their grant, and/or 

misunderstanding the grant processes and requirements. Because survey skip logic did not prompt 

these respondents to answer subsequent questions about the factors that influenced their not

completing the grant requirements, findings related to these factors should be interpreted with caution. 

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

1 

Introduction 

There is a shortage of highly qualified individuals teaching in high-need fields and schools in the United 

States (U.S. Department of Education 2016b). The Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher 

Education (TEACH) Grant aims to increase the number of teachers in high-need fields and schools by 

helping prospective and current teachers finance college and graduate school. First implemented by the 

U.S. Department of Education in 2008–09, the TEACH Grant provides up to $4,000 per year to 

undergraduate and graduate students enrolling in coursework to become a teacher. In the 2015–16 

award year, 774 institutions awarded grants to at least one student, and the average institution 

awarded grants to 40 students; more than 30,800 students received grants in total, with almost $90 

million disbursed to these recipients.4 To meet the requirements of the TEACH Grant, recipients must 

teach in a high-need field such as reading specialist, mathematics, or science, at a high-need school, for 

at least four years in an eight-year period and annually certify that they intend to meet this 

requirement. If a recipient does not meet the grant requirements or does not annually certify progress 

toward completing their service obligation, the grant converts to an unsubsidized loan (U.S. Department 

of Education 2016a).

To meet the TEACH Grant requirements, students must do the following: 

• Be enrolled as an undergraduate, postbaccalaureate, or graduate student at an institution that 

participates in the TEACH Grant Program. 

• Meet certain academic achievement requirements (generally, scoring above the 75th percentile on 

one or more portions of a college admissions test or maintaining a cumulative GPA of at least 3.25). 

• Receive TEACH Grant counseling. 

• Sign an agreement to serve in the teaching profession in a high-need field at a high-need school 

for a minimum of four years in an eight-year period. 

• Provide documentation of annual certification indicating that they intend to teach at or are 

currently teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school after completing their program. 

For this report, grant recipients who left school and continue to satisfy the certification requirements or 

have successfully completed the four-year commitment are referred to as “recipients in grant status,” 

and recipients who did not meet the requirements and whose grants converted to loans are referred to 

as “recipients in loan status.”

A 2015 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that large numbers of TEACH Grant 

recipients did not meet the grant requirements (GAO 2015). Similarly, using extant data from the loan 

servicer, this study found that 63 percent of the recipients who began their service obligation period 

 

4 Federal Student Aid Title IV Program Volume Reports for Grant Programs, as of January 31, 2017.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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prior to July 2014 converted the TEACH Grant to an unsubsidized loan prior to June 2016.

5 Conversion 

rates were similar across public, proprietary, and private institutions. Moreover, the GAO study of the 

federal grant and loan forgiveness programs for teachers suggests that how a program is structured and 

managed also influences its success.

Results from the GAO report align with existing research findings on teacher and physician loan 

forgiveness and service scholarship programs. Research suggests that programs that provide small 

amounts are not effective when the financial benefit does not offset the cost of professional 

preparation. For example, the authors found that the Arkansas State Teacher Education Program

provided an average of $3,000 per year to teachers, but this amount was too low to attract teachers. 

Similarly, the Oklahoma Future Scholarships, providing approximately $1,000 to $1,500 per year to 

teacher candidates, did not influence whether the recipient pursued a career teaching science (Podolsky 

and Kini 2016).

The study also found, however, that when the financial benefit offsets the cost of professional 

preparation, these programs could successfully recruit and retain high-quality professionals into fields 

and communities where they are most needed. Programs such as the National Science Foundation 

Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship, the Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, and the North Carolina Teaching 

Fellows Program appeared to influence candidates’ decisions to complete the teacher certification 

program, to teach low-income students, and remain in the field (Podolsky and Kini 2016).

Study Research Questions

Three main questions guided this study: 

1. How do TEACH Grant recipients view the grant requirements and to what extent do 

recipients fulfill those requirements?

2. What factors are associated with TEACH Grant recipients not meeting the grant requirements?

3. How do institutions of higher education administer TEACH Grants and support grant recipients?

Data Sources

The study included three primary forms of data collection in 2016: 

• Surveys: (1) a survey of the 472 institutions that awarded TEACH Grants to at least 

10 recipientsin 2014–15,

6 and (2) a survey of 500 separated grant recipients, who were no 

longer enrolled in the institution from which they received the grant, meaning they 

graduated or withdrew from the institution. Appendix A includes exhibit tables with the 

data from the survey analyses.

 

5 Using extant data for the entire institutional population, grant-to-loan conversion rates were derived by first calculating the 

cumulative total number of recipients from award years 2008–2014 who had begun their service obligation prior to July 1, 

2014, for each institution. Then, the number of those recipients for whom at least one grant had been converted to a loan 

was divided by the total to get the conversion rate. Recipients identified with a death or disability status, or whose grants 

had been canceled, were excluded. For more information, see Appendix C.

6 Based on Federal Student Aid Title IV Program Volume Reports for Grant Programs, as of July 15, 2015.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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• Interviews: Interviews were conducted with faculty and staff at a nonrepresentative sample of 

nine institutions administering TEACH Grants. Appendix B includes the case study narratives. 

• Extant Data. The study included examining the following: 

– Administrative data on TEACH Grants (e.g., recipient, institution, conversion status, and 

academic level). 

– Documents provided by institutions that were used to promote awareness about the 

TEACH Grant (e.g., flyers or emails).

Sample Selection, Data Collection Activities, and Analysis Methods

This section describes the sample selection for each data source, data collection activities, and methods used 

to analyze the data. The majority of the data collection activities occurred between June and August 2016. 

Appendix C includes additional detail about sample selection, data collection, and analysis methods.

Institution of Higher Education Survey

The target population was defined as institutions that awarded TEACH Grants to at least 10 recipients in 

the 2014–15 award year. From 788 institutions that awarded grants in 2014–15, 472 institutions met the 

eligibility criteria and were invited to participate in the IHE Survey. These 472 institutions awarded the 

grants to 95 percent of the recipients in that award year. The data collection period started in late May 

2016 and ended in late August 2016. The questionnaire covered topics related to the implementation 

and administration of the grant, including any challenges related to grant administration (see Appendix 

D for the questionnaire). This survey was administered primarily through an online platform, with a 

small minority (6 percent) of the respondents completing a paper questionnaire. The Department sent 

the initial survey invitations by U.S. Mail to the financial aid officer primarily responsible for coordinating 

the grants at each selected institution; each invitation letter included a personalized URL to the Web 

survey for the institution. Nonresponse follow-up efforts extended for a 10-week period and included up 

to five email reminder messages that included the survey link, up to eight telephone reminder call 

attempts, and one paper questionnaire mailing. The final response rate to the IHE Survey was 

73 percent.

To represent the entire population of institutions in the analysis, the response data from the IHE Survey 

were weighted to adjust for entire survey nonresponse by using extant data for each institution to 

calculate response propensities (see Appendix C for more information). Most of the analysis of the IHE 

Survey data set involved tallying the responses to the survey items and weighting these tallies to 

account for survey nonresponse. Much of the questionnaire asked institutions to report the incidence of 

certain activities (e.g., communication about the grant to students, methods of counseling recipients, 

and job placement services) performed by various institutional units (e.g., financial aid office or career 

services office) across various student subgroups. To simplify the analysis of these items, the student 

subgroups were collapsed so that incidence of the activities could be compared across institutional 

units. Finally, analysis of the institution data to address the second research question (factors associated 

with recipients not meeting the grant requirements) involved cross-tabulating the incidence of grant 

administration activities (collapsed to the overall institutional level) by the average institutional grantto-loan conversion rate. Tests for statistical significance were not performed when analyzing the IHE 

Survey data because those tests consider differences in light of sampling error; because the survey

sample included the entire population of institutions that awarded at least 10 grants in the 2014–15 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

4 

year, statistical significance tests were not appropriate. Weighting adjustments were made to 

compensate for nonresponse bias. 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey

A stratified, random sample was drawn of 500 recipients who had received the grant and had graduated 

or withdrew (i.e., separated) from one of the 472 institutions selected for the study prior to July 1, 2014. 

The starting sample frame included 69,809 separated recipients whose grants did not have a status of 

death or other life circumstances and for whom complete contact information was available. Recipients 

who did not receive any grants from one of the 472 institutions included in the IHE Survey were 

removed from the sampling frame. The final sampling frame contained 63,023 recipients. 

The recipient sample was stratified by institution type (e.g., public, private nonprofit, or proprietary), 

the geographical region of the institution (i.e., Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, Southwest, and West), 

and the grant-to-loan conversion status (i.e., recipients in loan status and recipients in grant status). The 

sample of 500 recipients, evenly split between recipients in loan status and recipients in grant status, 

was designed to have the power to detect differences between these two groups at a 90 percent 

confidence level, assuming a 70 percent response rate for both halves of the sample. Of the nearly 

26,000 recipients who had completed or were in the process of completing their service requirements 

(i.e., recipients in grant status), 250 people were selected, and of approximately 37,000 recipients 

whose grants had been converted to loans (i.e., recipients in loan status), 250 people were selected.

The data collection period started in early July 2016 and ended in mid-September 2016. The final 

response rate to the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey was 64 percent, with a higher response rate for 

recipients in grant status (78 percent) than for recipients in loan status (51 percent).

The analysis data set for the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey was weighted to adjust for entire survey 

nonresponse using two methods: (1) post-stratification and (2) using extant data for each recipient to 

calculate response propensities. Most of the analysis for this data set involved tallying the responses to 

the survey items and weighting these tallies to account for survey nonresponse, several items were 

cross-tabulated by the grant-to-loan conversion status, and differences between recipients in loan 

status and recipients in grant status were tested for statistical significance. More details about the 

weighting and nonresponse analyses can be found in Appendix C. 

Interviews for Case Studies 

Interviews in a nonrepresentative sample of nine institutions were selected to include a range of 

characteristics, conditions, and outcomes. The sample selection and interview processes were intended 

to yield information to illustrate some of the ways in which institutions administer the TEACH Grant in 

various types of institutions. The following characteristics were used to select the sample:

• Number of TEACH Grants awarded. Institutions that awarded at least 10 grants in the 2014–15 

award year and more than 100 grants before July 1, 2014 (178 institutions met this criterion).

• Geographic region. Institutions across the five geographic regions: Northeast, Southeast, 

Midwest, Southwest, and West.

• Distance learning. One institution classified as a distance-learning institution, defined as having 

75 percent or more of the students enrolled in distance education coursework. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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• Sector. Five public institutions, three private institutions, and one proprietary institution.

• TEACH Grant-to-loan conversion rates. Institutions with both high and low percentages of 

TEACH Grants in loan status. The average grant-to-loan conversion rate for the population of 

178 institutions that met the first criterion for inclusion was 56 percent. The nine-site sample 

included four institutions with rates at or above the average and five below the average. Grantto-loan conversion rates ranged from approximately 40 percent to 70 percent. 

• Academic levels of the TEACH Grant recipients. Institutions that administered TEACH Grants to 

students at various academic levels in their institution enrollment (e.g., freshman year, senior 

year, graduate level).

Appendix B presents the case study narratives based on the interview data. 

In-person interviews were conducted at six institutions and telephone interviews were conducted at 

three institutions. The interviews were conducted with deans of education, teaching program coordinators,

field placement coordinators, job placement counselors, financial aid officers, and other institutional 

staff involved in the administration of the grants. Semistructured interview protocols were aligned to

the research questions and tailored to each type of institutional staff. Appendix C details the type of 

interviews conducted at each institution and Appendix D includes the interview protocols.

To analyze and report the interview data, a set of codes were developed and aligned to the research 

questions and the interview protocols. NVivo qualitative data analysis software was used to code the

interview transcripts using the set of codes. The coded data were then used to identify themes related to 

the research questions. In addition to using interview data to answer the research questions, the interview 

data were used to write six in-depth case studies describing institution implementation of the grant.7

 

Extant Data

Extant data were obtained from the Federal Student Aid National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) 

and from the loan servicer, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency (PHEAA). PHEAA 

provided a grant-level data file describing all grants in their databases including information such as 

the institution that administered the grant, the recipient who received the grant, the status of the 

grant (e.g., converted to a loan, service completed, service required, death), and the service obligation 

start date for the grant. In addition, recipient-level data derived from NSLDS included demographic 

characteristics, including gender, Pell Grant status, and Stafford loan amount. These data were

analyzed both in their entirety (e.g., calculating grant-to-loan conversion rates for various segments of 

the recipient population) and by linking the data to the sub-set of survey records (e.g., crosstabulating survey responses with recipient demographics). See Appendix C for more details about the 

extant data.

In conjunction with the IHE Survey, documents used by institutions in the administration of the grants 

were solicited. These documents were coded by type: whether they were application forms, 

informational materials (e.g., fact sheets, frequently asked questions, or website material), 

promotional materials (e.g., flyers or posters), direct outreach (email templates or letters to students), 

or counseling materials. Documents also were coded by type if they were created and distributed by an 

 

7 Case study summaries were prepared for the six sites in which interviews were conducted with at least four staff members.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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external source (such as the Department, rather than by the institution). In addition, documents were 

coded according to the information they included, with three types of information considered most 

crucial: (1) information on the grant’s eligibility and service requirements, (2) information on grant-toloan conversion, and (3) information on annual certification of teaching status. After coding, the 

documents were analyzed thematically to describe the commonalities and differences in how 

institutions administered the grants.

Study Limitations

Readers should note some limits to the interpretation and generalizability of the study findings. For 

instance, the interviews were semistructured, purposefully allowing some variability in the questions. 

Interviews were limited to individuals identified by college of education leaders; therefore, it is unclear 

whether institutional staff interviewed provided complete information about how the institution 

administers the TEACH Grant. Because only a small number of institutions were interviewed, the 

interview findings are not generalizable to other institutions.

Some under-coverage of the target population exists in the extant data and recipient survey sample 

frame. In July 2013, the federal loan servicer managing the TEACH Grant changed. Because the current 

servicer was not contracted to service all recipients whose grants converted to loans or whose service 

obligation was completed prior to the transition, the current servicer did not obtain complete records 

for these recipients, representing about 6 percent of the recipients in the target population. As a result, 

these recipients are not accounted for in conversion rate calculations presented in this report. In 

addition, the current servicer did not have service obligation start dates for roughly 12,000 grants that 

were converted to loans by the prior servicer. Based on the assumption that these converted grants had 

a service obligation start date prior to the servicer transition, these converted grants represent 14 

percent of the recipients with an observed or assumed service obligation start date prior to the 2013 

transition. Because these recipients could not be accurately assigned to an individual-year cohort, 

conversion rates were calculated based on a combination of multiple cohorts.

The sample frame for the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey excluded about 9 percent of the recipients in 

the target population because they lacked any contact information available to the study team. Because 

most of these recipients’ grants had been converted to loans before the 2013 servicer transition, the 

sample underrepresented recipients who converted earlier in the program (prior to 2013). See 

Appendix C for more information.

An examination of the survey response patterns among recipients whose grants had been converted to 

loans revealed that a significant number of those respondents (32 percent) answered a question about 

the likelihood of completing the grant requirements by selecting categories that indicated they had 

already completed the requirements or were likely to do so. The inconsistency of these responses with 

their administrative status may have been a result of respondents misunderstanding the question in the 

way the item was worded and structured, misunderstanding the current status of their grant, and/or 

misunderstanding the grant processes and requirements. These respondents were not asked 

subsequent questions about the factors that influenced their completion of the grant requirements 

because the questionnaire routed respondents who indicated they had completed or were likely to 

complete past questions about these factors. As a result, the findings related to the factors that 

influence the completion of the grant requirements are limited. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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TEACH Grant Recipient Views and Outcomes

This chapter describes the influence of the grant on recipients’ decisions to pursue teaching as a career, 

recipients’ expectations about meeting the service requirements, how many recipients had their grants 

converted to loans, and how loan limits could have been exceeded if the grant were provided as a loan 

from the outset. 

Key Findings 

• Almost half (44 percent) of the TEACH Grant recipients said that the TEACH Grant was 

somewhat or very influential in their decisions to pursue teaching as a career, and 

58 percent said the TEACH Grant was somewhat or very influential in their decisions to 

pursue teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school.

• Eighty-nine percent of the TEACH Grant recipients thought they were likely or very likely to 

fulfill the service requirements when they first received their grant.

• Among TEACH Grant recipients who began their eight-year service obligation period prior to 

July 2014, 63 percent had their grants converted to an unsubsidized loan because they did not

meet the service requirements or the annual certification requirements as of June 2016. 

• For TEACH Grants that are eventually converted to loans, in many cases these grants would 

have caused recipients’ financial aid packages to exceed federal loan limits if they had been 

provided as loans from the outset.

Influence of TEACH Grant on Student Decisions to Pursue Teaching

Both the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey and the IHE Survey asked respondents to report on how much 

the grants influenced students’ decisions to pursue a career in teaching and specifically a teaching 

career in a high-need field at a high-need school. Results from both surveys were similar. 

Almost half (44 percent) of the TEACH Grant recipients said that the TEACH Grant was 

somewhat or very influential in their decisions to pursue teaching as a career, and 

58 percent said the TEACH Grant was somewhat or very influential in their decisions to 

pursue teaching in a high‐need field at a high-need school. 

Thirty-three percent of the recipients said that the grants were not at all influential on their decisions to 

pursue teaching as a career (see Exhibit 1). Nineteen percent of the recipients said that the grants were 

not at all influential on their decisions to pursue teaching in a high-need field and school.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 1. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how influential the TEACH Grant 

was as an incentive to pursue teaching as a career or to pursue teaching in a high-need 

field and school

Exhibit reads: Twenty-three percent of the recipients said that TEACH Grants were very influential on their 

decisions to pursue teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=322; see Exhibit A2.3a in Appendix A). 

Likelihood of Meeting the Grant Requirements

TEACH Grant recipients were first asked to report about how likely they thought they were to fulfill the 

service requirement at two points in time: (1) after receiving their first grant and (2) the day of survey 

completion. After the latter question, those who reported that they were unlikely to complete, they did not 

know how likely they were to complete, or their grants had already been converted to loans were asked 

follow-up questions to ascertain which factors influenced their ability to meet the program requirements. 

Eight-nine percent of the TEACH Grant recipients thought they were likely or very likely to 

fulfill the service requirements when they received their first grant. 

Among the recipients whose grants converted to loans, 86 percent indicated that after receiving their 

first grant, they thought they were likely or very likely to fulfill the four-year service requirement to 

teach in a qualifying high-need field and school. Among recipients in grant status, 94 percent indicated 

that they had initially thought they were likely or very likely to fulfill the service requirements (see 

Exhibit 2).8

 

8 The percentage distribution difference between recipients in grant status and recipients in loan status for those who 

selected “Very likely” is statistically significant (p < 0.01). The differences for those who reported “Likely,” “Unlikely or very 

unlikely,” and “Did not know” are not statistically significant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

9 

Exhibit 2. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients’ likelihood of fulfilling the service requirements 

at the time of receiving their first TEACH Grant, by grant-to-loan conversion status

Exhibit reads: Fifty-eight percent of the recipients indicated that they were very likely to fulfill the service 

requirements when they first received their grant. 

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=322; see Exhibit A2.2a in Appendix A).

At the time of survey completion, 56 percent of the recipients reported that they were likely 

or very likely to complete the service requirements — or had already completed them. 

Among recipients in grant status, 55 percent indicated that currently they were very likely to fulfill the 

service requirements, and 7 percent indicated that they were likely to fulfill the service requirements. In 

addition, 26 percent had already completed the service requirements. However, 40 percent of the 

recipients in loan status reported that currently they were very likely (10 percent), likely (5 percent), or 

unlikely or very unlikely (8 percent) to fulfill the service requirements or that they had already met 

service requirements (17 percent; see Exhibit 3). This incongruity between survey response and program 

status might be a result of misunderstanding the survey question, misunderstanding their grant status, 

or both. As a result, the findings related to this item should be interpreted with caution.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 3. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients’ likelihood of fulfilling the service requirements 

at the time of survey completion, by loan conversion status 

Exhibit reads: Twenty-nine percent of the recipients indicated that they were very likely to fulfill the service 

requirements at the time of survey completion. 

— = Not applicable.

^ = Interpret with caution. Recipients in loan status who reported they were very likely, likely, unlikely, or very unlikely to meet or had already 

met service requirements were responding inconsistently relative to their program status.

Note: For recipients in loan status, 0.8 percent said “Do Not Know” and are not shown in this graph.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=319; see Exhibit A2.2b in Appendix A).

Conversion Rates from Grants to Loans

Using extant data for the entire institutional population, grant-to-loan conversion rates were derived by first 

calculating the cumulative total number of recipients from award years 2008–2014 who had begun their 

service obligation period prior to July 1, 2014, for each institution. Then, the number of those recipients for 

whom at least one grant had been converted to a loan was divided by the total to get the conversion rate. 

Recipients identified with a death or disability status, or whose grants had been canceled, were excluded.

Among TEACH Grant recipients who began their eight-year service obligation period prior 

to July 2014, 63 percent had their grants converted to an unsubsidized loan because they 

did not meet the service requirements or the annual certification requirements as of 

June 2016. 

Six percent had completed the service requirements, and the remaining 31 percent had grants requiring 

service (see Exhibit 4). 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 4. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status

Exhibit reads: Sixty-three percent of all recipients who had begun their service obligation period prior to July 1, 

2014, had their grant converted to a loan. 

Source: Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency as of June 2016 (n=78,623; see Exhibit A4 in Appendix A).

Chapter Summary

This chapter presented findings about how recipients recalled the extent to which the grant influenced 

their decisions to pursue teaching, how recipients perceived their likelihood of completing the grant 

requirements, and how many recipients converted their grants to loans. Forty-four percent of the 

recipients who were surveyed indicated that the grant was somewhat or very influential on their

decision to pursue teaching as a career, and 58 percent said the grant was somewhat or very influential 

on decisions to teach in a high-need field in a high-need school. 

Eighty-nine percent of all recipient respondents indicated that they were likely or very likely to fulfill the 

service requirements when they first received their grant. Ultimately, however, as of June 2016, 63 

percent of the recipients who had entered their service obligation period at least two years prior had 

their grants convert to unsubsidized loans. 

 

 

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

13 

Recipient Factors Associated with Not Meeting

the TEACH Grant Requirements

This chapter presents findings about the recipient factors associated with recipients’ not meeting the 

grant requirements, including details on factors such as not annually certifying and teaching in a 

nonqualifying position. These recipient factors include reported employment and educational 

circumstances, reported understanding of grant requirements, and personal characteristics. In addition, 

this chapter provides comparisons of recipients’ perceptions of how informed they were about the grant 

requirements between recipients whose grants converted to loans and recipients whose grant

requirements were met or require service (i.e., in grant status). The chapter concludes with a discussion 

of grant-to-loan conversion rates and their association with recipient characteristics such as gender, Pell 

Grant recipients, and academic level at the time of first grant award. 

Key Findings 

• Factors related to employment that are influential to not completing the service 

requirements, as reported at the time of survey completion by grant recipients in loan status, 

included teaching in a position that did not qualify for TEACH Grant service (39 percent) and 

not working as a certified teacher (33 percent).

• Thirty-two percent of the recipients in loan status reported not understanding the service 

requirements as an influencing factor to not completing those requirements.

• Factors related to annual certification that are influential to not completing the service 

requirements, as reported at the time of survey completion by grant recipients in loan status, 

included not certifying because they did not know about the annual certification process

(19 percent) and not certifying because of challenges related to the certification process 

(13 percent). 

• TEACH Grant recipients who were in loan status were less likely than those who were in grant 

status to say they were well informed about the service requirements during the process of 

obtaining their first grant (39 percent and 65 percent, respectively). 

• Grant-to-loan conversion rates were higher among males, students with federal loans, and 

Pell Grant recipients. 

TEACH Grant recipients were first asked to report about how likely they thought they were to fulfill the 

service requirement at two points in time: (1) after receiving their first grant and (2) the day of survey 

completion. After the latter question, those who reported that they were unlikely to complete, that they 

did not know how likely they were to complete, or that their grants had already been converted to loans

were asked follow-up questions to ascertain which factors influenced their inability to meet the program 

requirements. They were asked to respond with a yes or no to each factor, which allowed them to say 

yes to multiple factors. These factors included situations that would eventually lead to loan conversion if 

they persisted — like teaching in a nonqualifying position — as well as situations that would 

immediately lead to loan conversion — that is, not certifying annually. The annual certification

requirement is part of the Agreement to Serve, and the annual certification itself is required to 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

14 

document teaching in a high-need field and school; for this reason, factors related to annual certification 

are included on the list of factors influencing the completion of the service requirements.

Factors Associated with Recipients Not Meeting

the TEACH Grant Requirements 

Sixty-eight percent of the recipients in loan status reported factors influential to not completing the 

service requirements (see Exhibit 5). These factors fall into three broad categories: factors related to 

employment include situations that affect whether recipients obtain positions that qualify for grant 

service, factors related to understanding the service requirements include situations in which the 

recipients did not understand the requirements to complete grant service, and factors related to annual 

certification pertain to the administrative process by which recipients maintain their grant status. 

Exhibit 5. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients in loan status who reported factors that 

influenced their not fulfilling the service requirements

Exhibit reads: Thirty-nine percent of the recipients in loan status indicated at the time of survey completion that 

teaching in a position that does not qualify for TEACH Grant service is a factor that influenced their not fulfilling the 

service requirements. 

This exhibit presents responses to two related survey questions that were asked only of those respondents who had reported in a previous 

question that either their grants had already been converted to loans or they were unlikely or unsure of their likelihood to complete the service 

requirements. The first of these two survey questions asked respondents to select any or all factors influential to not completing the service 

requirements (see Exhibit A2.2c). The second asked the 44 percent of respondents who reported not annually certifying as a factor in the first 

question to select one reason why they did not certify (see Exhibit A2.2d, which, in contrast to this exhibit, uses that 44 percent of respondents 

as the denominator). As a result, the percentages of “factors related to employment” and “factors related to understanding requirements” may 

not be directly comparable to “factors related to annual certification.” The total percentage will not sum to 100 percent because respondents 

could select more than one response category.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016. (n=88; see Exhibit A2.2c and A2.2d in Appendix A).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Factors related to employment that are influential to not completing the service 

requirements, as reported at the time of survey completion by grant recipients in loan 

status, included teaching in a position that did not qualify for TEACH Grant service 

(39 percent) and not working as a certified teacher (33 percent).

Thirty-two percent of the recipients in loan status reported not understanding the service 

requirements as being an influencing factor to not completing those requirements.

Factors related to annual certification that are influential to not completing the service 

requirements, as reported at the time of survey completion by grant recipients in loan 

status, included not certifying because they did not know about the annual certification 

process (19 percent) and not certifying because of challenges related to the certification 

process (13 percent). 

Forty-four percent of the recipients in loan status reported factors related to not annually certifying as 

influencing their not completing the grant requirements: 19 percent reported not certifying because 

they did not know about the annual certification process, 13 percent reported not certifying because of 

challenges related to the process, 9 percent reported not certifying because they forgot, and 2 percent 

reported not certifying for another reason.9

Twenty-four percent of the recipients in loan status also reported other factors, such as never being 

certain of intention to teach or not meeting state requirements for a highly qualified teacher, as 

influencing their not completing the service requirements.

Among the 12 percent of recipients in grant status who indicated that they were very unlikely, unlikely, 

or unsure of their likelihood to complete their service requirements, the most common factor was 

teaching in a nonqualifying position (47 percent). Other common factors were not understanding the 

service requirements (44 percent) and not teaching or not completing a degree or teaching certificate 

(33 percent).

Recipients could select more than one factor, and some selected factors related to both annual 

certification and employment. For example, two respondents reported that they did not annually certify

because (1) they did not know about annual certification or the process and (2) they were teaching in a 

nonqualifying position because they could not obtain a qualifying position.

As discussed previously (see Study Limitations), the reader should note that findings related to these 

survey questions are limited because, in a previous question, 32 percent of the recipients in loan status 

reported that they were likely or very likely to complete the service requirements or that they had 

already completed the service requirements (see Exhibit 3). These respondents were logically skipped 

past questions about factors influencing the conversion of their grants to loans and therefore are not 

included in these analyses. Eight percent of the recipients in loan status reported that they were unlikely 

or very unlikely to complete the service requirements. Although these respondents were asked the 

questions about contributing factors, the inconsistency of their responses to the question about 

likelihood to complete the requirements relative to their program status may indicate that their 

responses to the factors questions also are limited. 

 

9 The total of these annual certification subcomponents do not sum to 44 percent because of rounding. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

16 

When asked why they were teaching in a nonqualifying position, 43 percent of the recipients in loan 

status did not choose one of the provided answer choices in the survey but instead wrote in specific 

reasons, such as a school losing its Title I designation, a previous qualifying position being eliminated,

confusion about whether a position qualified, teaching students from low-income families in a nonqualifying

school, or not being certified in a high-need field. Between 13 percent and 15 percent of them decided 

that they did not want to teach in a high-need field in a high-need school, applied to one or more 

qualifying positions but were not offered the position, could not find a job in a high-need field in a highneed school, or found a higher paying teaching position at a nonqualifying school (see Exhibit 6). 

Exhibit 6. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients in loan status who reported the reason they are 

teaching in a nonqualifying position

Exhibit reads: Fifteen percent of the respondents in loan status reported that they were teaching in a 

nonqualifying position because they could not find a job in a high-need field and school. 

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=30; see Exhibit A2.2e in Appendix A).

Recipient Understanding of Program Requirements

The TEACH Grant Recipient Survey respondents were asked to report about how well informed they 

were about the various components of the service requirement at two points in time: (1) after receiving 

their first grant and (2) after leaving their teacher preparation program. Each time period will be 

discussed in turn.

TEACH Grant recipients who were in loan status were less likely than those who were in 

grant status to say they were well informed about the service requirements during the 

process of obtaining their first grant (39 percent and 65 percent, respectively). 

Reports of being well informed about the service requirements varied based on whether the recipient 

had a grant converted to a loan or not. Among recipients whose grants converted to loans, 35 percent 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

17 

indicated they were somewhat or not informed about the service requirement during the process of 

obtaining their first grant compared with 13 percent of the recipients in grant status (Exhibit 7).10

Exhibit 7. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how well informed

they were about the four-year service requirement to teach in a qualifying

high-need field and school, during the process of obtaining

their first TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status

Exhibit reads: Sixty-five percent of the recipients in grant status indicated that they were well informed about the 

four-year service requirement to teach in a qualified high-need field at a high-need school during the process of 

obtaining their first TEACH Grant.

Note: The response categories “somewhat informed” and “not informed” were collapsed to prevent disclosure of confidentiality.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=322; see Exhibit A2.1b in Appendix A).

Recipients in loan status were half as likely as recipients in grant status to indicate they 

were well informed about the requirements to annually certify their intent to teach in a 

high-need field and school (22 percent and 46 percent, respectively). 

Conversely, 21 percent of the recipients in loan status indicated that they were not informed about the 

service requirements after leaving their teacher preparation program compared with 5 percent of the

recipients in grant status (see Exhibit 8).11 

 

10 The percentage distribution differences between recipients in grant status and recipients in loan status for those who 

reported “well informed” and “somewhat informed and not informed” are statistically significant (p < 0.001). The difference 

for those who reported “moderately informed” is not statistically significant.

11 The percentage distribution differences between the grant status and loan status groups for those who reported “well 

informed” and “not informed” are statistically significant (p < 0.001). The difference for those who reported “somewhat 

informed” also is statistically significant (p < 0.05). The difference for those who reported “moderately informed” is not 

statistically significant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 8. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how well informed

they were about the requirement to annually certify their intent to teach

in a high-need field and school, after leaving their teacher

preparation program, by loan conversion status

Exhibit reads: Forty-six percent of the recipients in grant status indicated that they were well informed about the 

requirement to annually certify their intent to teach in a high-need field at a high-need school after leaving their 

teacher preparation program.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=295; see Exhibit A2.1a in Appendix A).

Recipients in loan status were not significantly more likely than recipients in grant status 

to indicate they were not informed about determining whether a specific teaching position 

qualified under the TEACH Grant. 

Exhibit 9 presents a comparison of recipients in loan status who indicated they were well informed 

about determining whether a specific teaching position qualified under the grant (35 percent) to 

recipients in grant status who made that indication (41 percent). However, none of the differences 

between recipients in grant status and recipients in loan status are statistically significant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 9. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who reported how

well informed they were about determining whether a

specific teaching position qualified under the TEACH Grant

Exhibit reads: Forty-one percent of the recipients in grant status indicated that they were well informed about 

determining whether a specific teaching position qualified under the TEACH Grant.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=295; see Exhibit A2.1c in Appendix A).

Institution Perspective on Reasons for Grant-to-Loan Conversion

Case studies of institutions also provided data on grant-to-loan conversions. Staff members at eight of 

nine institutions noted that it was difficult to monitor grant recipients after graduation, so they were 

unsure what drove the grant-to-loan conversion rate at their institutions. However, most staff members 

offered a variety of possible explanations based on what they had seen or experienced with students in 

their institutions. 

Many believed that these individuals were in one of the following situations: they had found jobs in 

fields that were no longer considered high need, were unable to fulfill the high-need field percentage 

time requirement, or had left the teaching profession altogether. One respondent illustrated one 

possibility, saying, 

I think the other thing is about [high-need] subjects, because [students] think, “Well I’m from 

such-in-such state and that’s a high need right now, and I’m going back there," but then they 

meet someone else and they get married and they move to Texas instead of Missouri.

Some interviewed staff suspected that the current high grant-to-loan conversion rate was inflated by 

the effect of the recession years on job markets, noting that the labor market during the recession made 

it difficult for recipients to find positions in eligible fields several years ago but that the situation seemed 

to have improved since that time. Some respondents suggested that students either consciously used 

the grant as a loan or they were willing to take the risk of a future loan to fund their college education. 

One staff member explained as follows:

I do not tolerate it or condone it or anything, but I met students where that extra money 

[from the TEACH Grant] was a difference [for] them being full time that term or not, and 

they were fully willing to take on whatever loans that may come if they change their mind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Recipient Characteristics Associated with Grant-to-Loan Conversions

Extant, administrative data of recipient characteristics were analyzed for correlation with grant-to-loan 

conversion.12

Grant-to-loan conversion rates were higher among males, students with federal loans, and 

Pell Grant recipients. 

Among TEACH Grant recipients who began their service obligation period before July 1, 2014, 67 percent 

of male recipients had a grant converted to a loan versus 62 percent of female recipients. Females also 

outnumbered males and represented 81 percent of this recipient population. Sixty-five percent who 

were federal loan borrowers had a grant converted to a loan versus 47 percent of those who were not 

federal loan borrowers. Borrowers outnumbered nonborrowers and represented 91 percent of this 

recipient population. Sixty-six percent of the students who were Pell Grant13 recipients had a grant 

converted to a loan versus 58 percent of those who were not Pell Grant recipients. Pell Grant recipients 

represented 61 percent of this recipient population (see Exhibit 10).

The conversion rates did not differ by first-generation college status. The conversion rate was the same 

for first-generation college students and non-first-generation college students at 63 percent. In addition, 

rates did not differ substantially by academic level. Sixty-four percent of the recipients who received all 

their grants as an undergraduate had a grant converted to a loan versus 63 percent of the recipients 

who received all their grants as a graduate student (see Exhibit 11). 

 

12 These extant, administrative data constitute a universe of recipients; therefore, this analysis did not employ tests for 

statistical significance.

13 The federal Pell Grant program provides need-based grants to high-needs undergraduate and certain postbaccalaureate 

students to promote access to postsecondary education.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

21 

Exhibit 10. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status, by academic level, 

gender, first generation status, federal loan borrower status, and Pell Grant status

Exhibit reads: Sixty-four percent of the recipients who received all their grants as an undergraduate student had 

their grants converted to a loan. 

Source: Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency as of June 2016 (n=78,623; see Exhibit A4 in Appendix A).

Conversion of a grant to a loan was not associated with recipients’ academic level when 

receiving their first TEACH Grant. Among the recipients who began their service obligation

period before July 1, 2014, the conversion rates of the various education levels at which 

recipients obtained their first grant ranged from 60 percent to 65 percent (see Exhibit 11). 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit 11. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status,

by academic level after receiving first TEACH Grant

Exhibit reads: Sixty-four percent of the recipients who received their first grant as freshmen had a grant converted 

to a loan.

Note: The status of TEACH Grants as of June 2016 for the sample of grants available in PHEAA databases that had a service obligation start date 

prior to July 1, 2014. See Appendix C for more details on methodology.

Source: Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency as of June 2016 (n=78,623; see Exhibit A4 in Appendix A).

Conversion rates were similar across public, private, and proprietary institutions. Sixty-three percent of 

the recipients who received their first grant from a public or private institution and 66 percent from a 

proprietary institution had their grant converted (Exhibit 12). 

Exhibit 12. Distribution of TEACH Grant recipients by grant or loan status, by institutional sector

Exhibit reads: Sixty-three percent of the recipients who received their first grant from a public institution had their 

grant converted to a loan. 

Source: Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency as of June 2016 (n=78,623; see Exhibit A4 in Appendix A).

Timing of When Recipients Receive TEACH Grants

Among recipients whose grants were converted to loans, 85 percent were accepted into a 

teacher preparation program prior to receiving the TEACH Grant — about the same 

percentage as for recipients in grant status (84 percent).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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The percentages of TEACH Grant recipients in loan status and recipients in grant status who were 

accepted and admitted into a teacher preparation program prior to receiving their first grant was very 

similar (see Exhibit 13).14 It should be noted that no explicit program policy prohibits institutions from 

giving grants to students not yet in a teacher preparation program, so it is at the institutions’ discretion 

to decide whether they will allow this internally. Institutions also can decide when they give students 

the grants. 

Exhibit 13. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who were accepted and admitted into a teacher 

preparation program prior to or after receiving their first TEACH Grant

Exhibit reads: Eighty-four percent of the recipients in grant status were accepted and admitted into a teacher 

preparation program prior to receiving their first TEACH Grant.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=292; see Exhibit A1.6a in Appendix A).

Chapter Summary

Factors associated with recipients not meeting the grant requirements included factors related to 

employment, understanding grant requirements, and factors related to annual certification. Recipients

in loan status were less likely than recipients in grant status to report that they were well informed 

about the service requirements during the process of obtaining their first grant.

Some characteristics of the TEACH Grant recipients were associated with higher grant-to-loan 

conversion rates. Recipients who were male, federal loan borrowers, or Pell Grant recipients had higher

grant-to-loan conversion rates.

 

14 The percentage distribution difference between recipients in grant status and recipients in loan status is not statistically 

significant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

25 

Institutional Administration of TEACH Grants 

The findings in this section describe how and why institutions administered the grant and the type of 

support they provide to the recipients.

Key Findings 

• Institutions were more likely to report using TEACH Grants to make higher education more 

affordable for students than to encourage students to pursue teaching in a high-need field at 

a high-need school.

• Within higher education institutions, TEACH Grants were primarily overseen by financial aid 

office staff rather than college of education staff. 

• For 42 percent of the students who received TEACH Grants in 2013–14, the sum of their 

TEACH Grants and federal loans in that year exceeded the federal annual loan limit.

• In an examination of common TEACH Grant administrative practices, 70 percent provided 

students with placement services for qualifying TEACH Grant service positions.

Institutional Goals for Use of TEACH Grants

Institutions were more likely to report using TEACH Grants to make higher education 

more affordable for students than to encourage students to pursue teaching in a highneed field at a high-need school.

Ninety-two percent of the IHE Survey respondents reported that one goal of the grant was to make

education more affordable for their students who are interested in teaching in high-need areas 

(Exhibit 14). Forty-nine percent indicated that they administered the grant to encourage students to 

pursue teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school.

As one staff member explained, their institution administers the TEACH Grant because 

We want students in those [high needs] as much as possible. The state has a great need 

for these areas, and the TEACH Grant is one of those ways that we try to encourage 

students to go into the field, knowing that they would get some financial incentive to 

join us and be in those areas. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

26 

Exhibit 14. Percentage of institutions of higher education reporting

certain institutional goals for the use of TEACH Grants

Exhibit reads: Ninety-two percent of the IHE Survey respondents indicated that they administered the TEACH 

Grant to make education more affordable for teacher candidates potentially interested in teaching in a high-need 

field at a high-need school. 

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.1a in Appendix A).

Institution Staff Roles Related to TEACH Grant Implementation 

Within higher education institutions, TEACH Grants were primarily overseen by financial 

aid office staff rather than college of education staff. 

Survey and interview data indicated that the financial aid office provides lead oversight of the TEACH 

Grant within institutions. Ninety-three percent of the IHE Survey respondents indicated that the 

financial aid office led oversight of the grant. Seven percent of the respondents indicated that other 

departments led oversight, including the college of education (see Exhibit 15). Institutional interviews15

supported the survey findings. During the staff interviews, financial aid office and college of education 

staff described how financial aid offices typically conduct administrative activities associated with the 

grant. Interviews with financial aid staff were conducted for seven sites. For these seven sites, the 

financial aid staff interviewed described how they typically assigned a point person or small team to 

work on the grant and serve as the “expert.” 

 

15 Institution interviews were conducted with a nonrepresentative sample of institutions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

27 

Exhibit 15. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department

with the lead oversight for TEACH Grant administration

Exhibit reads: In 93 percent of the institutions, the financial aid office takes the lead on oversight of the TEACH Grant.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.3a in Appendix A).

During interviews, the financial aid staff described their involvement in TEACH Grant administration, 

including how they determined initial and ongoing student eligibility for the grant while students were 

enrolled in the institution. Staff at three of nine institutions discussed the use of data systems to 

automatically capture eligibility information, whereas the other six institutions manually confirmed 

student eligibility. When asked about activities conducted to administer the grant, financial aid staff at 

six of the seven sites who had financial aid staff interviewed also indicated that they counseled students 

on grant requirements, both in person and online. Staff created and disseminated informational 

materials about the grant and trained and informed college of education staff about the grant.

In interviews, college of education staff at all nine institutions described some involvement with TEACH 

Grant administration, stating that they typically work with the financial aid office to review and verify 

eligible college of education programs and eligible students. This included informing financial aid offices 

of high-need certification areas, in addition to corresponding majors, minors, and teacher education 

programs. At seven of nine institutions, staff also informed students about the grant through college of 

education events or courses. At four of nine institutions, college of education staff specifically described 

how they worked collaboratively with the financial aid office to support grant administration; for 

example, one dean of education said:

We are a very collaborative environment. Our services are all college driven and 

collaboratively developed. For example, with respect to the TEACH Grant, we drive which 

programs are eligible for those grants. We’re the ones that review that academic 

program to see if it meets the qualifications, not only at a federal level but at a state 

level, and then work directly with [financial aid] to make sure that those programs are 

the only ones that are available to our students. 

In contrast, two college of education deans stated that college of education staff had little involvement 

with the grant program. For example, one said:

The College of Education isn’t all that much involved in it [the TEACH Grant]. It’s handled 

really with financial aid. Students learn about it partially through them. Our advisors can 

tell students about it mostly as we talk about other resources, but then the financial aid 

people I’m sure will deal with the counseling specifically about the TEACH Grants. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Promoting Awareness of the TEACH Grant

In almost all institutions, the financial aid office informed students about the availability of 

TEACH Grants. 

Almost all (96 percent) of the IHE Survey respondents indicated that the financial aid office informed 

students about the grant (Exhibit 16). Fifty-eight percent of the IHE Survey respondents reported that 

the college of education informed students of the grant. 

Exhibit 16. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department that informs 

students about the TEACH Grant 

Exhibit reads: Ninety-six percent of the IHE Survey respondents indicated that the financial aid office informs 

students about the availability of TEACH Grants.

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Total percentage will not sum to 100 percent because respondents could select 

more than one response category.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.2b in Appendix A).

Similarly, the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey respondents indicated that they first learned about the grant 

from a financial aid office representative, more than from any other source (58 percent). Thirteen percent of

the recipient respondents indicated they heard about the grant from an instructor or a professor.16

Interview data revealed that the process by which students heard about the grant varied across 

institutions, and even within institutions, and the source through which students were introduced to the 

grant varied (Exhibit 17). However, those interviewed at all nine sites stated that students most often 

found out about the grant through interactions with the financial aid office. 

 

16 However, the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey did not ask in which department the instructor or professor taught.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

29 

Exhibit 17. Percentage of TEACH Grant recipients, by information source

from which recipients first learned about the TEACH Grant 

Exhibit reads: Fifty-eight percent of all recipients indicated that they first learned about the TEACH Grants from a 

financial aid office representative. 

‡ = Reporting standards not met. Either there are too few cases for a reliable estimate or the coefficient of variation (CV) is 50 percent or greater.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Total number of TEACH Grant recipient respondents unweighted = 322. 

Total percentage will not sum to 100 percent because respondents could select more than one response category. Standard errors (SE) are 

relative to the percentages.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=322; see Exhibit A1.2c in Appendix A).

Staff members at eight sites were asked about using the TEACH Grant as a recruitment tool. Six sites 

described some use of the grant by institutions to recruit candidates into teaching and high-need fields 

and schools. A dean of the college of education at one institution summarized as follows: 

I think especially for those people who are interested in teaching in one of those [highneed] fields, I think it at least gets their attention... I think for those who might be 

wavering too, maybe they want to be a teacher but they’re not sure exactly which field 

to go into, whether it’s elementary education or special education. I think knowing that 

the TEACH [Grant] is there, I think that might help them in making that decision.

Institutions primarily used in-person communication to promote awareness of the 

TEACH Grants. 

Based on the IHE Survey, person-to-person contact was the primary mode of communication to 

promote awareness of the grants (79 percent), followed by use of a website (61 percent) or email 

(48 percent). Institutions less frequently reported using events (28 percent) or flyers (25 percent) to 

communicate with students about the grants (see Exhibit 18).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

30 

Exhibit 18. Percentage of institutions of higher education that used various modes of 

communication to inform students about the TEACH Grant

Exhibit reads: Seventy-nine percent of the IHE Survey respondents reported at least one office or department 

informed students about the TEACH Grant through person-to-person contact.

Note: The response categories “career services” and “other” were collapsed to prevent disclosure of confidentiality.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.2a in Appendix A).

Counseling 

In addition to counseling from the U.S. Department of Education that TEACH Grant recipients must 

complete each year before receiving their grant funds, institutions also provide counseling services to 

students about the grant and its requirements. However, these counseling services can vary by the 

office responsible for providing the counseling, whether the counseling is stand alone or integrated20

into larger discussions about financial aid, whether the counseling is mandatory or optional, and 

whether the counseling is available in person or online. 

The financial aid office was the primary provider of counseling specific to the TEACH 

Grant program.

The IHE Survey results showed that, for all counseling types, the most common provider of counseling

was the financial aid office. For example, 65 percent of the IHE Survey respondents reported their 

financial aid office provided integrated optional in-person counseling compared with the college of 

education (21 percent), career services/other (6 percent), or another field-specific school or department 

(3 percent; see Exhibit 19). Similarly, Exhibit 20 shows that 56 percent of the IHE Survey respondents 

reported that their financial aid office provided stand-alone optional in-person counseling compared 

with the college of education (18 percent), career services/other (6 percent), or another field-specific 

school or department (3 percent).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

31 

Exhibit 19. Percentage of institutions that provided integrated mandatory or optional counseling

either in-person or online by office or department

Exhibit reads: Sixty-five percent of the IHE Survey respondents reported their financial aid office provided 

integrated optional in-person counseling. 

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Response categories “Career Services” and “Other” were collapsed to prevent 

disclosure of confidentiality.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.4a and A1.4b in Appendix A).

Exhibit 20. Percentage of institutions that provided stand-alone mandatory or optional

counseling either in-person or online by office or department

Exhibit reads: Fifty-six percent of the IHE Survey respondents reported that their financial aid office provided 

stand-alone optional in-person counseling. 

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Response categories “Career Services” and “Other” were collapsed to prevent 

disclosure of confidentiality.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.4a and A1.4b in Appendix A).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

32 

Optional, in‐person counseling was the primary form of guidance that institutions 

provided to the TEACH Grant recipients. 

The most common type of counseling provided for both integrated and stand-alone delivery methods, 

regardless of the office providing it, was optional counseling held in-person: 72 percent of the

institutions offered this format of integrated counseling, and 65 percent of the institutions offered this 

format of stand-alone counseling (see Exhibit 21). Many institutions provided mandatory online 

counseling17 — either stand-alone (31 percent) or integrated (40 percent). 

Exhibit 21. Percentage of institutions of higher education offering TEACH Grant counseling, by 

type of counseling provided

 

Exhibit reads: Seventy-two percent of the IHE respondents reported at least one office or department provided 

integrated forms of optional in-person counseling. 

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.4a and A1.4b in Appendix A).

In seven of nine sites, interview respondents indicated that the financial aid office did the bulk of 

counseling on the grant and that it often occurred as a part of larger conversations about financial aid 

packages. All interviewed college of education advisors had general knowledge and awareness of the 

grant. They all described speaking with students about financial aid in general, and the grant was 

sometimes part of those conversations if the student was considering a qualifying certification area. 

However, all advisors interviewed indicated that they would direct students to the financial aid office for 

specific information on the grant. College of education staff at two institutions expressed hesitation 

about discussing the specific details of the grant with students, because of concerns about providing 

inaccurate information about the grant requirements. One college of education advisor described her 

approach to discussing the grant with students as follows:

I say, “I’ll tell you about [the TEACH Grant], but we want you to work with financial aid. 

They go through that at counseling. We want you to really understand... Be sure you 

 

17 The IHE Survey did not clarify that respondents should not include the Department-administered online counseling session 

that is required of recipients in their responses about mandatory counseling, so it is possible that some institutions 

misinterpreted these questions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

33 

know what you’re doing because if you’re not going to go into a high-need area, highneed field, if you realize that teaching’s not for you, you’ve got to pay this back with 

interest.” I say things like that because I’ve heard horror stories. I don’t want to just say 

nothing, but I don’t want to be the one who tells them to get it or not. That has to come 

from [the financial aid office].

During interviews, financial aid staff described providing counseling services at their institutions 

throughout the various stages of students’ postsecondary careers. As required by the grant, institutions 

reported providing students with initial counseling on the grant online or in person. After initial 

counseling, interactions with students about the grant typically included reminders about completing 

the annual agreement to serve. These interactions also often reinforced the eligibility and service 

requirements of the grant. Interviewed staff at five of nine institutions also described conducting exit 

counseling with grant recipients, but they noted that it often was difficult to successfully schedule 

students at that late point in their postsecondary careers. A college of education advisor at one 

institution mentioned that he or she did not know which students had TEACH Grants, and data on this 

would be useful to help track and monitor students’ eligibility and meeting grant requirements.

Prevalence of Institutional Practices Associated

with Lower Grant-to-Loan Conversion Rates

A wide range of institutional practices were identified in the IHE Survey and interviews that restricted 

eligibility for the TEACH Grant recipients or provided placement services. Some of these practices 

included setting eligibility requirements, such as declaring a major or minor in a high-need field, being 

admitted to a teacher preparation program, and excluding freshmen and sophomores. Other practices 

included placement services for employment. 

To analyze whether any of these eligibility restriction or placement services were related to lower grantto-loan conversion rates, the conversion rate of all recipients who had begun their grant service 

obligation period prior to July 1, 2014, was calculated for each institution. Then the average conversion 

rate of institutions that reported a specific practice was compared with the average conversion rate of 

those that did not report that practice. 

As shown in Exhibit 22, the following practices showed the largest percentage point differences in average 

conversion rates between institutions that reported employing the practice and those that did not: 

• Freshmen and sophomores were not eligible to receive TEACH Grants. 

• Only students who declared a major or minor in high-need fields were eligible to receive the 

TEACH Grants.

• Only students who were admitted into a teacher preparation program were eligible to receive 

the TEACH Grants. 

• Relationships were established with schools that had qualifying service teaching positions. 

In contrast, the following institutional practices did not appear to correlate with the institutional 

conversion rate:

• Only students who declared a major or minor in teaching were eligible to receive TEACH Grants.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

34 

• Only students who completed a minimum number of courses in a specific field were eligible to 

receive TEACH Grants.

• Guidance was provided to students about how to identify qualifying service teaching positions.

Exhibit 22. Variation in grant-to-loan conversion rates by reported

use of various institutional practices

Exhibit reads: Institutions that required TEACH Grant recipients to declare a major or minor in a high-need field 

had a 3 percent lower average conversion rate than institutions that did not have this requirement. 

Note: In general, these figures are similar to those calculated after excluding institutions that only offer TEACH Grants to graduate students. 

Difference in average conversion rates may not reflect difference between separate average figures due to rounding. Excludes 10 institutions 

with less than 10 recipients that had a service obligation start date prior to July 1, 2014.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=335; see Exhibit A3.1a and 3.1d in Appendix A).

Although conversion rates did not vary substantially based on the recipient’s academic 

level at time of their first TEACH Grant, institutions that excluded freshmen and 

sophomores from the TEACH Grant opportunity had a lower average conversion rate. 

Previously, using extant data in Chapter III, Exhibit 11, the academic level at which recipients receive 

their first grant does not appear to be related to their overall likelihood to convert their grants to loans. 

Yet, according to IHE Survey respondents, the institutional practice of excluding freshman and/or

sophomores from being eligible to receive grants had the largest difference in conversion rates of any of 

the institutional practices included in the IHE Survey. That said, relatively few institutions (16 percent) 

exclude freshman and/or sophomores from being eligible to receive the grants (see Exhibit 23). This fact 

and the small number of recipients at these institutions may explain why the academic level at which 

recipients receive their first grant does not appear related to their overall likelihood to convert their 

grants to loans, but other unobservable characteristics likely contribute to this apparent discrepancy. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

35 

Exhibit 23. Percentage of institutions of higher education that reported using various practices

Exhibit reads: Fifty-five percent of the IHE Survey respondents indicated that they required TEACH Grant recipients

to declare a major or minor in a high-need field. 

Note: In general, these figures are similar to those calculated after excluding institutions that only offer TEACH Grants to graduate students. 

Excludes 10 institutions with fewer than 10 recipients that had a service obligation start date prior to July 1, 2014. 

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=335; see Exhibit A3.1a and 3.1d in Appendix A).

Financial aid staff interviewed for the study indicated that although they are required to adhere to the 

federal TEACH Grant eligibility requirements, they added additional requirements — to the extent 

permissible under the program — for students to receive the grants. According to staff at one institution, 

students could not access the grant as underclassmen but must wait to receive the grant, often until their 

junior year or until they are able to enroll in the college of education. At five of nine institutions participating 

in interviews, students could receive the grant as early as in their freshmen year if they meet the federal 

requirements for TEACH Grants. 

Interviewees at the institutions that restricted the use of the TEACH Grant tended to believe these 

decisions were made primarily to limit the grant to students most likely to complete their degree in 

education and fulfill the service requirements of the grant. One college of education staff member 

commented as follows: 

Because you can give [the TEACH Grant] to them right out of high school, and then the 

first semester they don’t have a 3.25 [grade point average], and then you’re done and it 

goes to a loan. [The university administration] decided at the very beginning we’re only 

going to do it for juniors and seniors.

However, a respondent at an institution that offered the TEACH Grant to students who are in the early 

stages of their academic careers believed that their policy benefits those students, stating, 

Some schools will limit it until [students] are junior or seniors. [At our institution] some of 

them may get it as early as a freshman. This is the beauty of this for our institution 

because of the limited funds [for students], and we know they’re going to teach.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

36 

How Grants Relate to Federal Annual Loan Limits 

Federal annual loan limits exist to protect students from excessive borrowing. To estimate loan limits for 

each grant recipient in award year 2013–14 based on NSLDS data, the amount of the grant funds and 

the amount of the Stafford loan funds awarded for that academic year were summed and compared 

with the annual federal loan maximum set for the recipient’s academic level (highest reported) and 

dependency status.18 

For TEACH Grants that are eventually converted to loans, in many cases these grants

would have caused recipients’ financial aid packages to exceed federal annual loan limits 

if they had been provided as loans from the outset. 

In 2013–14, 42 percent of the grant recipients would be borrowing over their federal annual loan limit if 

their grants were considered loans.

Field and Job Placement Services 

In an examination of common TEACH Grant administrative practices, 70 percent of the 

institutions provided students with placement services for qualifying TEACH Grant 

service positions. However, conversion rates were similar for institutions that did and did 

not report this practice.

Across the various types of job placement services, the college of education at the institution was most 

often responsible for providing the placement services. Regardless of the department or office provider, 

more than half of institutions provided guidance to students on how to identify TEACH Grant-qualifying

positions (58 percent; see Exhibit 24). Forty-eight percent of the institutions indicated that they 

provided an updated list of available positions to students, and 46 percent indicated that they 

established relationships with schools that have eligible positions.19 However, none of the interviewed 

staff from any of the nine case study institutions described career and job placement services or 

practices that were specific to the grant recipients or indicated that they were aware of whether 

students were grant recipients, unless the student explicitly stated it.

Forty-six percent of the institutions had relationships with K–12 schools with qualifying 

positions. However, conversion rates were similar for institutions that did and did not 

report this practice.

The responsibility for job placement services within institutions was most commonly assumed by college 

of education staff (33 percent) or career services staff (16 percent; see Exhibit 24). The conversion rates 

were similar for institutions using this practice (59 percent) and institutions not using this practice 

(61 percent). Financial aid offices more frequently participated in providing guidance on how to identify 

qualifying positions compared with the other two types of services. 

 

18 The sum of grant and loan funds does not account for (1) undergraduate students whose annual loan limits are increased as 

a result of parents’ denial of PLUS loans and (2) loan periods that are borrower based, which skew the assignment of award

years to loans, which then may overestimate or underestimate the amount of loans in an award year for borrower-based 

students.

19 The question in the IHE Survey referred to students generally because such respondents may have interpreted this as 

placement services provided to any student, not just TEACH Grant recipients. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

37 

Exhibit 24. Percentage of institutions of higher education that reported

providing various types of placement services for positions that

qualify for TEACH Grant requirements, by office or department

Exhibit reads: Seventy percent of the IHE Survey respondents indicated one or more offices or departments 

provided students with any type of placement service. 

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n=345; see Exhibit A1.5a in Appendix A).

During interviews, institutional staff corroborated this survey finding by explaining that institutions 

often leveraged district partnerships to identify and post positions for teacher preparation students in 

general. However, none of the institutionalstaff mentioned any specific partnerships or efforts with districts

for placing grant recipients specifically into high-need fields at high-need schools. Staff from five of the 

nine institutions noted that their district partners did have qualifying grant positions available. Institutional

staff from four of the nine institutions described district-level staff playing an active role in approaching 

and engaging with institutions to fill those positions. One staff member explained as follows: 

Ninety percent plus [of districts] would have been high-need areas. It’s not something 

that we’re having to do a whole lot of legwork. We have people reaching out to us that 

are wanting to recruit here.

These findings were consistent with those gleaned from interviews with institutional staff. College of 

education staff described a variety of career and job placement services provided to students, including 

career planning, assistance with résumés, interviews, networking, newsletters and websites with job 

postings, and job fairs. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

38 

Staff interviewed at four institutions stated that the grant recipients interested in finding employment in 

a high-need school could locate qualifying schools in their respective regions. According to one staff 

member who was asked whether TEACH Grant-qualifying opportunities were available for students, 

“There are so many schools within [our state] that fall within the requirements of the TEACH Grant.” The 

same staff member also mentioned that labor market factors have affected job placement for grant 

recipients; notably, this person believed that students faced much more difficult prospects in finding 

qualifying teaching work during the recession years, but this difficulty had largely passed as the 

economy recovered. 

In addition to job placement support, interviewed staff at all the institutions described extensive, 

diverse field experience opportunities that the college of education offered and required of teacher 

candidates. Staff at two institutions specifically mentioned a requirement that education students 

complete field experience in a high-need school setting. 

Chapter Summary

Financial aid offices at institutions primarily administered the TEACH Grant and were involved in most 

administrative processes. Consistent with this finding, more than half the recipient respondents 

indicated that they first learned about the grant from a financial aid office representative. Almost all the 

institutions reported using the grants to make higher education more affordable for students, whereas 

only about half reported using the grants to encourage students to pursue teaching in a high-need field 

at a high-need school. The financial aid office also was the primary provider of counseling specific to the 

TEACH Grant program. 

However, one specific area where the primary responsibility shifted away from the financial aid office 

was job placement services. Across the various types of job placement services, the school or 

department of education was the most common provider. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

39 

Summary of Findings

This study sought to examine why many TEACH Grant recipients did not meet the grant requirements 

and, as a result, had their grants converted to loans. As part of this examination, this study collected 

information to better understand institutional practices in implementing the grant program, including 

how institutions promote awareness of the program and how they support grant recipients as students 

complete their teacher education programs and obtain employment. The study also aimed to identify 

factors associated with grant recipients not meeting the grant requirements. 

Grant Requirements

Forty-four percent of the recipients who were surveyed indicated that the grant was somewhat or very

influential on their decision to pursue teaching as a career and 58 percent indicated that the grant was 

somewhat or very influential on their decision to teach in a high-need field in a high-need school. 

In hindsight, 58 percent of all recipient respondents indicated that they believed they were very likely to 

fulfill the service requirements when they first received their grant. Ultimately, however, 63 percent of 

the recipients had their grants convert to an unsubsidized loan. 

Factors Associated with Not Meeting Grant Requirements 

Factors associated with recipients not meeting the grant requirements included factors related to 

employment, understanding grant requirements, and factors related to annual certification. 

Compared with those in grant status, a lower percentage of recipients in loan status indicated being well 

informed about the service requirements while obtaining their first TEACH Grant and the requirement to 

annually certify their intent to teach in a high-need field at a high-need school after graduation. 

Some grant recipient characteristics were associated with higher grant-to-loan conversion rates. Males, 

federal loan borrowers, or Pell Grant recipients had higher grant-to-loan conversion rates. 

How Institutions Administer TEACH Grants

Almost all the institutions reported using the grants to make higher education more affordable. About 

half the institutions reported using the grants to incentivize teaching candidates to pursue teaching 

positions in high-need fields and schools.

In almost all institutions, the TEACH Grant program is administered by financial aid office staff, not 

college of education staff.

However, one specific area where the primary responsibility shifted away from the financial aid office 

was job placement services. Across the various types of job placement services, the college or 

department of education was the most common provider. The majority of institutions provide 

placement services for teaching positions. 

If their grants were considered as loans from the onset, 42 percent of the recipients could be borrowing 

over the federal loan limits.

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

41 

References

American Association for Public Opinion Research. 2015. Standard Definitions: Final Dispositions of Case 

Codes and Outcome Rates for Surveys. 8th edition. Oakbrook Terrace, IL: AAPOR. Accessed 

February 15, 2017. https://www.aapor.org/AAPOR_Main/media/publications/StandardDefinitions2015_8theditionwithchanges_April2015_logo.pdf

Government Accountability Office. 2015. Better Management of Federal Grant and Loan Forgiveness 

Programs for Teachers Needed to Improve Participant Outcomes (GAO 15-314). Washington, DC: 

United States Government Accountability Office.

Kolenikov, Stanislav. 2014. “Calibrating Survey Data Using Iterative Proportional Fitting (Raking).” The 

Stata Journal 14 (1): 22–59.

Podolsky, Anne, and Tara Kini. 2016. How Effective Are Loan Forgiveness in Service Scholarships for 

Recruiting Teachers. Washington, DC: Learning Policy Institute. Accessed September 25, 2017. 

https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/sites/default/files/product-files/How_Effective_AreLoan_Forgiveness_and_Service-Scholarships_Recruiting_Teachers.pdf

Therneau, Terry, Beth Atkinson, and Brian Ripley. 2015. rpart: Recursive Partitioning and Regression 

Trees. R package version 4.1-10.

U.S. Department of Education. 2016a. TEACH Grants. Federal Student Aid. Accessed February 20, 2017.

https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/types/grants-scholarships/teach

U.S. Department of Education. 2016b. Teacher Shortage Areas Nationwide Listing 1990–1991 through 

2016–2017. Office of Postsecondary Education. Accessed May 31, 2017. 

http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ope/pol/tsa.doc

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

43 

Appendix A. Institutions of Higher Education

and Recipient Data Tables

Exhibit A1.1a. Percentage of institutions of higher education reporting certain institutional goals

for the use of TEACH Grants 

Institutional goal Percentage

Encourage education students to pursue teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school 49.3

Make education affordable for teacher candidates potentially interested in teaching in a highneed field at a high-need school92.0

Other 5.9

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345).

Exhibit A1.1b. Percentage of institutions of higher education reporting the level of influence of

TEACH Grants on student decisions

Influence of TEACH Grants on student decisions Percentage

How influential are TEACH Grants on students’ decisions to pursue

teaching as a career?

Total 100.0

Very influential 4.9

Somewhat influential 30.9

Not influential 40.8

Don’t know 23.5

How influential are TEACH Grant eligibility requirements on students’ decisions to pursue 

teacher certification in TEACH Grant-qualifying fields and schools? 

Total 100.0

Very influential 9.7

Somewhat influential 28.0

Not influential 32.4

Don’t know 29.6

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345).
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

44 

Exhibit A1.2a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department and by the modes 

of communication that institutions use to inform students about the TEACH Grant 

Institutional office or department Email Events Flyers

Person-toperson 

contact Website

Total (at least one office or 

department)

48.4 28.1 24.6 79.5 61.5

Financial aid office 39.2 20.5 18.8 67.8 59.2

School or department of education 18.5 15.6 13.6 43.4 17.5

Other field-specific school or 

department

4.3 5.4 3.6 7.5 2.1

Career services and other 4.8 5.7 2.7 13.3 5.0

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. The response categories “career services” and “other” were collapsed to prevent 

disclosure of confidentiality. The results for student subgroups within each office or department have been collapsed.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345). 

Exhibit A1.2b. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department that inform

students about the TEACH Grant

Office(s) or department(s) that inform students about TEACH Grant Percentage

Total (at least one office or department) 100.0

Financial Aid Office 95.7

School/Department of Education 58.1

Other Field-Specific School or Department 11.2

Career Services and Other 17.1

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

45 

Exhibit A1.2c. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients,

by information source from which recipients first learned about the TEACH Grant

and by loan conversion status

Information source

Recipients in loan status Recipients in grant status

t test of recipient 

in loan status and 

recipients in grant 

Percentage SE Percentage SE status

Total 100.0 — 100.0 — — 

Financial aid office 

representative

63.2 4.6 50.6 3.7 2.14 *

Instructor or professor 12.5 3.1 12.7 2.5 0.05

Counselor 9.0 ! 2.8 3.7 ! 1.3 1.68

Another student 9.4 2.4 21.4 3.0 3.14 **

College or university website 7.9 ! 2.6 10.7 2.3 0.81

College or university flyer ‡ ‡ 2.4 ! 1.1 — 

Other 7.6 ! 2.5 14.6 2.6 1.94

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The coefficient of variation (CV) for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

‡ = Reporting standards not met. Either there are too few cases for a reliable estimate or the CV is 50 percent or greater.

*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Total percentage will not sum to 100 percent because respondents could 

select more than one response category. Standard errors (SE) are relative to the percentages.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 322). 

Exhibit A1.3a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by office or department with the lead

oversight for TEACH Grant administration

Office or department with the lead oversight Percentage

Total 100.0

Financial aid office 93.5

School or department of education 4.8

Other field-specific school or department 1.7

Career services 0.0

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

46 

Exhibit A1.4a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by the types of TEACH Grant integrated

counseling provided and by office or department

Institutional office or department

Optional 

online 

counseling

Mandatory 

online 

counseling

Optional inperson 

counseling

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling

Institutions that 

selected

“not applicable” 

Total (at least one office or 

department)

25.9 39.9 72.2 14.0 22.0

Financial aid office 22.6 38.6 65.0 9.1 15.1

School or department of education 6.5 5.2 20.5 6.1 8.6

Other field-specific school or 

department

1.6 0.0 3.1 0.0 0.8

Career services and other 1.3 1.3 6.5 1.3 2.4

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. The response categories “career services” and “other” were collapsed to prevent 

disclosure of confidentiality. The results for student subgroups within each office or department have been collapsed.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345). 

Exhibit A1.4b. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by the types of TEACH Grant

stand-alone counseling provided and by office or department

Institutional office or department

Optional 

online 

counseling

Mandatory 

online 

counseling

Optional inperson 

counseling

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling

Institutions that 

selected

“not applicable” 

Total (at least one office or 

department)

17.1 30.9 65.0 14.5 29.5

Financial aid office 14.3 28.8 56.5 9.7 22.6

School or department of education 4.6 6.1 18.4 6.1 10.5

Other field-specific school or 

department

1.4 0.0 2.8 0.0 1.1

Career services and other 1.5 1.3 5.8 1.3 2.6

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. The response categories “career services” and “other” were collapsed to prevent 

disclosure of confidentiality. The results for student subgroups within each office or department have been collapsed.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016 (n = 345). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

47 

Exhibit A1.5a. Percentage of institutions of higher education, by the types of placement services

provided for qualifying TEACH Grant service positions and by office or department

IHE office or department

Any type pf 

placement 

service

Providing guidance 

on how to identify 

positions that 

qualify for service

Providing an 

updated list of 

available positions 

to students

Establishing 

relationships with 

schools that have 

eligible positions

Total (at least one office or 

department)

70% 58% 48% 46%

School/department of 

education

42% 33% 24% 33%

Career services 31% 12% 26% 16%

Financial aid office 27% 24% 5% 1%

Other field-specific school 

or department

9% 4% 5% 5%

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. 

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016, (n = 345).

Exhibit A1.6a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who

were accepted and admitted into a teacher preparation program prior to or after

receiving their first TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status

Timing of when TEACH Grant was received

Recipients in 

loan status

Recipients in 

grant status

t test of recipients in 

loan status and 

recipients in grant 

Percentage SE Percentage SE status

Total 100.0 — 100.0 — — 

Accepted and admitted into teacher 

preparation program prior to receiving my 

first TEACH Grant

84.7 3.7 83.7 3.0 0.20

Accepted and admitted into teacher 

preparation program after receiving my 

first TEACH Grant

15.3 3.7 16.3 3.0 0.20

— = Not applicable.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. One recipient chose not to respond to this question, and recipients who 

were never formally enrolled in a teacher preparation program or did not know of the option to enroll were not asked this question. SE = 

standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 292). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

48 

Exhibit A2.1a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who

reported how well Informed they were about the requirement to annually certify

their intent to teach in a high-need field at a high-need school, on leaving their

teacher preparation program, by loan conversion status

Informed about the 

requirement to annually 

certify

Recipients in loan status Recipients in grant status

t test of recipients 

in loan status and 

recipients in grant 

status Percentage SE Percentage SE

Total 100.0 — 100.0 — — 

Well informed 22.0 4.3 46.0 3.7 4.25 ***

Moderately informed 25.9 4.7 30.3 3.3 0.75

Somewhat informed 30.6 4.7 18.8 3.0 2.13 *

Not informed 21.4 4.3 4.9 ! 1.5 3.64 ***

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The CV for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Recipients who were still enrolled in any institution at the time of interview 

were not asked this question. SE = standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 295). 

Exhibit A2.1b. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who

reported how well informed they were about the four-year service requirement

to teach in a qualifying high-need field at a high-need school, during the process

of obtaining their first TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status

Informed about the four-year service 

requirement to teach in a qualified highneed field at a high-need school

Recipients in 

loan status

Recipients in 

grant status

t test of 

recipients in loan 

status and 

recipients in 

Percentage SE Percentage SE grant status

Total 100.0 — 100.0 — — 

Well informed 38.5 4.6 64.5 3.5 4.47 ***

Moderately informed 26.2 4.1 22.7 3.1 0.67

Somewhat informed and not informed 35.3 4.6 12.7 2.5 4.31 ***

— = Not applicable.

*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. The response categories “somewhat informed” and “not informed” were

collapsed to prevent disclosure of confidentiality. SE = standard error of the percentage. 

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 322). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

49 

Exhibit A2.1c. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who

reported how well informed they were about determining whether a specific

teaching position qualified for TEACH Grant service, on leaving their teacher

preparation program, by loan conversion status

Informed about specific qualified TEACH 

Grant teacher positions

Recipients in 

loan status

Recipients in 

grant status

t test of recipients 

in loan status and 

recipients in grant 

status Percentage SE Percentage SE

Total 100.0 — 100.0 — — 

Well informed 35.4 4.9 41.3 3.7 0.96

Moderately informed 26.8 4.6 28.9 3.4 0.36

Somewhat informed 20.5 4.0 20.5 3.1 0.01

Not informed 17.3 4.0 9.3 2.1 1.77

— = Not applicable.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Recipients who were still enrolled in any institution at the time of interview 

were not asked this question. SE = standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 295). 

Exhibit A2.2a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported the likelihood of fulfilling the TEACH Grant four-year service requirement to 

teach in a qualifying high-need field at a high-need school, upon receipt of their first 

TEACH Grant, by loan conversion status

Likelihood of fulfilling four-year 

service requirement to teach in 

a qualifying high-need field in a 

high-need school

Overall 

percentage

Recipients in 

loan status

Recipients in 

grant status

t test of loan 

status and 

Percentage SE Percentage SE Percentage SE grant status

Total 63,023 — 37,131 — 25,892 — — 

Very likely 58.3 3.1 52.4 4.7 66.8 3.5 2.47 **

Likely 30.9 2.9 33.7 4.4 26.8 3.2 1.26

Unlikely or very unlikely 4.1 ! 1.3 5.0 ! 2.0 2.7 ! 1.1 1.03

Did not know 6.8 1.8 8.9 ! 2.8 3.7 ! 1.5 1.61

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The coefficient of variation (CV) for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001

NOTE: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Response categories “Unlikely” and “Very Unlikely” were collapsed to 

prevent disclosure. SE = Standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 322). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

50 

Exhibit A2.2b. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported the likelihood of fulfilling the TEACH Grant four-year service requirement

in a qualifying high-need field at a high-need school, at the time of survey completion, 

by loan conversion status

Likelihood of fulfilling four-year service 

requirement to teach in a qualifying 

high-need field in a high-need school

Overall percentage

Recipients in 

loan status

Recipients in 

grant status

Percentage SE Percentage SE Percentage SE

Total 100.0 — 100.0 — 100.0 — 

Service requirements already met 20.6 2.5 16.9 3.6 25.9 3.1

Very likely 28.5 2.4 10.4 2.9 54.7 3.7

Likely 6.0 1.5 5.0 ! 2.1 7.4 1.9

Unlikely or very unlikely 8.4 1.8 8.0 ! 2.6 8.9 ! 2.1

Do not know 1.7 ! 0.7 ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡

Not applicable: My grant(s) were already 

converted to loan(s)

34.8 2.8 58.9 4.7 — — 

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The coefficient of variation (CV) for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

‡ = Reporting standards not met. Either there are too few cases for a reliable estimate or the coefficient of variation (CV) is 50 percent or 

greater.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Response categories “Do not know” were excluded from theses analyses. 

Recipients in grant status who indicated “Not applicable: My grant(s) were already converted to loan(s)” were excluded from these analyses. SE 

= Standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 319). 

Exhibit A2.2c. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported factors that influenced their likelihood of completing the service 

requirements, at the time of survey completion, by loan conversion status

Factors influencing the 

likelihood of completing the 

service requirements

Overall percentage

Recipients in 

loan status

Recipients in 

grant status

Percentage SE Percentage SE Percentage SE

Total (any factor selected) 100.0 — 100.0 — 100.0 — 

Did not certify annually 41.0 4.9 43.9 5.5 18.0 ! 8.4

Did not understand the service 

requirements of the grant

32.9 4.9 31.6 5.3 43.6 10.8

Teaching in a position that does not 

qualify for TEACH Grant service

39.8 5.3 39.0 5.8 46.7 11.6

Not teaching or did not complete degree 

or teaching certificate

32.6 4.9 32.6 5.4 32.6 ! 10.2

Another factor 23.3 4.6 24.1 5.1 17.3 ! 8.2

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The coefficient of variation (CV) for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Recipients who had indicated in a previous question that their service 

requirements were already met or that they were “very likely” or “likely” to fulfill the TEACH Grant four-year service requirement were not 

asked this question. Total percent will not sum to 100 percent as respondents could select more than one response category. SE = Standard 

error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n=114).
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

51 

Exhibit A2.2d. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients whose

grants were converted to loans and who reported the reason they did not certify annually

Reason for not certifying annually Percentage SE

Total 100.0 — 

I forgot about annual certification 19.9 5.9

I did not know about annual certification or the process 44.0 9.0

I elected not to certify 0.0 — 

I found the annual certification process challenging 30.7 8.7

Other 5.4 ! 3.8

— = Not applicable.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Only recipients who indicated in a previous question that they did not

certify annually were asked this question. SE = Standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 40). 

Exhibit A2.2e. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients in loan

status who reported the reason they are teaching in a nonqualifying position

Reason for teaching in a position that does not qualify for TEACH Grant service Percentage SE

Total 100.0 — 

I decided I did not want to teach in a high-need field/at a high-need school 14.8 ! 7.3

I applied to one or more qualifying positions, but was not offered the position 14.5 ! 6.3

I could not find a job in a high-need field/at a high-need school 15.1 ! 7.2

I found a higher paying teaching position at a nonqualifying school 12.8 ! 6.3

Other 42.9 8.8

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The coefficient of variation (CV) for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Only recipients who indicated in a previous question that they were

teaching in a nonqualifying position were asked this question. SE = Standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 30). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

52 

Exhibit A2.2f. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients whose 

grants converted to loans who reported factors that influenced their likelihood of 

completing the service requirements at the time of survey completion, by whether not

certifying annually was a factor in conversion

Factors influencing the likelihood of completing the service 

requirements

Not annually 

certifying was a 

factor in loan 

conversion

Not annually 

certifying was NOT a 

factor in loan 

conversion

Percentage SE Percentage SE

Total (any factor selected) 100.0 — 100.0 — 

Did not understand the service requirements of the grant 36.1 8.4 28.0 6.5

Teaching in a position that does not qualify for TEACH Grant 

service

24.4 ! 7.5 50.4 7.9

Not teaching or did not complete degree or teaching certificate 14.3 ! 6.3 46.9 7.9

Another factor 0.0 — 35.4 7.6

— = Not applicable.

! = Interpret data with caution. The coefficient of variation (CV) for this estimate is between 30 percent and 50 percent.

‡ = Reporting standards not met. Either there are too few cases for a reliable estimate or the coefficient of variation (CV) is 50 percent or 

greater.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. Recipients who had indicated in a previous question that their service 

requirements were already met or that they were “very likely” or “likely” to fulfill the TEACH Grant four-year service requirement were not 

asked this question. Total percent will not sum to 100 percent as respondents could select more than one response category. SE = Standard 

error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 40). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

53 

Exhibit A2.3a. Percentage and standard error of the percentage of TEACH Grant recipients who 

reported how influential the TEACH Grant was as an incentive to pursue teaching as a 

career or teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school

Influence of TEACH Grant as incentive to pursue teaching Percentage SE

How influential was the TEACH Grant as an

incentive to pursue teaching as a career? 

Total 100.0 — 

Very influential 19.3 2.3

Somewhat influential 24.5 2.7

Not very influential 23.7 2.7

Not at all influential 32.5 3.1

How influential was the TEACH Grant as an incentive to pursue

teaching in a high-need field at a high-need school?

Total 100.0 — 

Very influential 23.5 2.4

Somewhat influential 35.3 3.1

Not very influential 21.7 2.8

Not at all influential 19.5 2.6

— = Not applicable.

Note: Data presented are weighted for sampling and nonresponse. SE = Standard error of the percentage.

Source: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, 2016 (n = 322). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

54 

Exhibit A3.1a. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher

education, by criteria used to limit eligibility of students to receive TEACH Grants

Institutional criteria for recipient eligibility

Institutions employing

eligibility criteria

Institutions not 

employing

eligibility criteria

Percentage 

point 

difference in 

average 

conversion 

Percentage rates

Average 

conversion 

rate Percentage

Average 

conversion 

rate 

Students must complete a minimum number 

of courses required for a teaching credential

8 58 92 61 -3 

Students must complete a minimum number 

of courses in a specific field/subject

5 61 95 60 1 

Students must declare a major and/or minor 

in high-need fields

55 59 45 62 -2 

Students must declare a major and/or minor 

in teaching

46 60 54 61 0 

Students must have been admitted into the 

teacher preparation program

48 60 52 61 -2 

Freshmen are excluded 22 57 78 61 -4 

Sophomores are excluded 16 56 84 61 -6 

Juniors are excluded 3 53 97 61 -8 

First-year graduate students are excluded 1 59 99 61 -2 

Students must achieve a GPA higher than the 

minimum set by the TEACH Grant

12 62 88 60 1 

Other 14 60 86 61 -1 

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Institutions with fewer than 10 TEACH Grant recipients from 2008 to 2014 were 

excluded from the analysis. Difference in average conversion rates may not reflect difference between separate average figures due to 

rounding.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016; Federal Student Aid National Student Longitudinal Data System, August 2015 (n = 335). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

55 

Exhibit A3.1b. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher 

education, by the modes of communication that institutions use to inform students 

about the TEACH Grant

Modes of 

communication

Institutions using mode of 

communication

Institutions not using mode of 

communication Percentage point 

difference in 

average 

Percentage conversion rates

Average 

conversion rate Percentage

Average 

conversion rate

Email 49 60 51 61 0 

Events 29 60 71 61 0 

Flyers 25 61 75 60 1 

Person-to-Person 

Contact

81 61 19 59 2 

Website 61 60 39 62 -2 

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Institutions with fewer than 10 TEACH Grant recipients from 2008 to 2014 were 

excluded from the analysis. Difference in average conversion rates may not reflect difference between separate average figures due to 

rounding.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016; Federal Student Aid National Student Longitudinal Data System, August 2015 (n = 335). 

Exhibit A3.1c. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher

education, by the type of TEACH Grant counseling provided

Types of TEACH Grant counseling

Institutions offering 

type of counseling

Institutions not offering 

type of counseling

Percentage 

point 

difference in 

average 

conversion 

Percentage rates

Average

conversion 

rate Percentage

Average 

conversion 

rate 

Integrated counseling

Optional online 26 60 74 61 -1 

Mandatory online 40 61 60 60 1 

Optional in-person 73 60 27 61 -1 

Mandatory in-person 13 59 87 61 -2 

Stand-alone counseling

Optional online 17 61 83 60 0 

Mandatory online 31 61 69 60 0 

Optional in-person 65 60 35 61 -1 

Mandatory in-person 14 58 86 61 -3 

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Institutions with fewer than 10 TEACH Grant recipients from 2008 to 2014 were 

excluded from the analysis. Difference in average conversion rates may not reflect difference between separate average figures due to 

rounding.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016; Federal Student Aid National Student Longitudinal Data System, August 2015 (n = 335). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

56 

Exhibit A3.1d. Percentage and average grant-to-loan conversion rate of institutions of higher 

education, by the types of placement services provided for qualifying TEACH Grant 

service positions

Types of placement services 

Institutions providing 

type of placement service

Institutions not providing 

type of placement service

Percentage 

point 

difference in 

average 

conversion 

Percentage rates

Average 

conversion 

rate Percentage

Average 

conversion 

rate 

Providing an updated list of 

available positions to students

48 60 52 61 -1 

Provide guidance on how to 

identify positions that qualify 

for service

58 60 42 61 -1 

Establishing relationships with 

schools that have eligible 

positions

46 59 54 61 -2 

Note: Data presented are weighted to adjust for nonresponse. Institutions with fewer than 10 TEACH Grant recipients from 2008 to 2014 were 

excluded from the analysis. Difference in average conversion rates may not reflect difference between separate average figures due to 

rounding.

Source: Institution of Higher Education Survey, 2016; Federal Student Aid National Student Longitudinal Data System, August 2015 (n = 335). 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

57 

Exhibit A4. Grant-to-loan conversion rates for all TEACH Grant recipients by gender, first

generation status, federal loan borrower status, Pell Grant status, academic level,

and institutional sector

Demographic characteristics

Total 

number

Recipients in 

loan status

(conversion rate)

Recipients 

in grant 

status 

(service 

required)

Recipients 

in grant 

status 

(service 

completed)

Overall 78,623 63% 31% 6%

Gender

Male 15,032 67% 27% 5%

Female 63,591 62% 32% 6%

First generation status

Not first generation 51,456 63% 31% 6%

First generation 27,167 63% 31% 6%

Federal loan borrower status

Nonborrower 7,225 47% 42% 11%

Borrower 71,398 65% 30% 6%

Pell Grant status

Not Pell Grant recipient 30,924 58% 34% 8%

Pell Grant recipient 47,699 66% 29% 5%

Academic level at first grant (collapsed)

Graduate 43,580 63% 30% 7%

Undergrad & graduate 1,743 53% 37% 10%

Undergraduate 33,300 64% 32% 4%

Academic level at first grant

1st year freshman 7,477 64% 34% 2%

2nd year sophomore 5,955 64% 33% 3%

3rd year junior 9,145 61% 34% 5%

4th year senior 9,673 65% 28% 7%

5th year undergraduate 2,781 64% 31% 5%

1st year graduate 28,365 60% 32% 7%

2nd year graduate 13,829 65% 27% 8%

Correspondence 1,376 100% 0% 0%

Institution sector

Public 37,588 63% 31% 6%

Private 34,022 63% 30% 6%

Proprietary 7,013 66% 28% 6%

Note: Data include all TEACH Grant recipients from award years 2008-2014 whose grant(s) had a service obligation start date before July 1, 

2014. 

Source: Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency as of June 2016 (n = 78,623). 

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

59 

Appendix B. Case Study Narratives

Small, Private Institution in the Northeast

Site Description

This institution is a small private rural college, with a total enrollment of less than 5,000. About 

100 students are enrolled in the teacher preparation program. At this institution, many of the students 

are the first in their families to attend college. For entering freshmen, the average financial aid package 

is about $27,000 and most incoming students receive some form of financial assistance mainly in the 

form of grants and scholarships in addition to student loans.

The institution administered the majority (approximately 65 percent) of its TEACH Grants to juniors and 

seniors, and the remaining to freshman and sophomores. Accordingly, very few TEACH Grants were 

administered to graduate students. Since 2009, the total number of TEACH Grants administered was 

approximately 200. To date, the institution’s grant-to-loan conversion rate has been approximately 60 percent. 

Administration of TEACH Grants

At this private institution, the financial aid office administers the TEACH Grant. Every semester, the 

financial aid office sends a list of the scholarships and grant programs to the education department to 

help inform faculty and students about potential sources of funding. The education department’s role is 

to disseminate information about the TEACH Grant to students and to instruct them to contact the 

financial aid office to learn more. The admissions office also plays a role by informing potential 

applicants and incoming students about the TEACH Grant’s benefits such as the amount of the grant and 

the requirements to teach in a high-need subject and high-need school.

The financial aid office automatically qualifies students for the TEACH Grant if they meet the grade point 

average minimum of 3.25 and are majoring in a discipline containing a high-need component. Thus, 

entering admitted freshmen or any student switching to a major containing a high-need component are 

immediately eligible to receive a TEACH Grant if they meet the grade point average requirement. Once 

the student is found to qualify, the financial aid office then prepares an aid letter that includes the entire 

package of aid that student could receive. The financial aid package contains scholarships and other 

available funds regardless of the student’s level of need. The section of the financial aid letter devoted 

to the TEACH Grant informs the student that receiving the grant hinges on completing the agreement to 

serve and attending a seminar to learn about the requirements of the grant. 

Grant recipients are required to attend an entrance seminar, presented by the financial aid office, where 

they learn about the details of their financial aid, including the requirements for the TEACH Grant. They 

also are told about situations that would cause the grant to become a loan, including not meeting the 

minimum grade point average, switching out of a qualifying major, or not meeting the obligation to 

teach for four years in a high-need subject at a high-need school. After attending the seminar, grant 

recipients are then required to sign an agreement to serve, which is collected by the financial aid office.

Every semester, the financial aid office monitors student eligibility by reviewing the list of students 

receiving the TEACH Grant and comparing their majors to the list of eligible majors. Those students who 

no longer qualify are then notified. The financial aid officer explained that students become ineligible 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

60 

because they often do not meet the minimum grade point average but that they tend to raise their 

grades within a semester. 

Use of TEACH Grants to Recruit and Assist Teacher Candidates 

Representatives from the admissions office visit several hundred high schools every fall to talk to 

prospective students about the college. The financial aid office hosts local financial aid workshops for 

interested students and parents. During these visits, they talk about financial aid, including the TEACH 

Grant. In addition to these workshops, the TEACH Grant is featured on the college website’s section on 

financial aid and includes an explanation of the Grant’s requirements and obligations. The institution 

also added information about the TEACH Grant to its recruitment materials. Admission staff believe that 

the TEACH Grant is useful in recruiting students to the college of education because parents often ask 

about the TEACH Grant.

The director of the college of education and the chair of the education division — both faculty at the 

college — said that all teacher candidates are placed in a high-need school for at least one of their 

clinical experiences, and because of the college’s location, such placement is often in a rural community. 

However, they also acknowledged that because faculty do not know which students received a TEACH 

Grant, they do not target support to help grant recipients meet the service requirement. After students 

graduate, faculty and staff do not follow-up with grant recipients. As a result, staff are unable to help 

them fulfill their service requirements due to the lack of communication after graduation.

TEACH Grant Successes and Challenges

The TEACH Grant is perceived as a helpful tool in recruiting students into the college of education 

because it helps them pay tuition, particularly because many students come from families without the 

resources to cover the cost of college. 

However, some students reportedly decline the TEACH Grant because of the service requirement. A 

financial aid officer said these students often come to her office, asking about how to get more aid. In 

some cases, the students declined the grant because they do not want to teach in an urban setting, and 

think that such a placement is required if they accept the TEACH Grant. The financial aid officer said that 

students are then reminded that a high-need setting also can include a rural school, which convinces 

some students to then accept the grant. These students are often more comfortable teaching in a rural 

school because many of them grew up in a rural setting. Another challenge is that students also tend to 

underestimate the value of their financial aid awards and likely do not understand the requirements of 

the agreement under the TEACH Grant. Financial aid staff feel that this is part of a more systemic issue 

with students not understanding their financial aid packages and direct loans.

Why TEACH Grants Convert to Loans

Different staff within the institution offered varied interpretations of graduates’ experiences and 

expectations of teaching in a high-need school. For example, the director of the college of education and 

the chair of the education division felt that graduates were unable to get jobs that would fulfill the 

service requirement, whereas, the admissions officer stated that such jobs were indeed available to 

graduates, and that the perception of a lack of jobs was incorrect. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

61 

Moreover, the financial aid officer explained that students may not have a full understanding of the 

requirements of the TEACH Grant. She said that although the financial aid office counsels students about 

the grant while they are enrolled, students still told her they were surprised by the amount they 

received through the grant program and the requirements to be fulfilled. She felt that some students 

accepted the grant knowing that it would ultimately convert to a loan for them because they needed the 

funds to pay tuition. They accepted the grant even if they were unsure that they would teach in a highneed school or high-need field. On the other hand, the faculty thought that students had a full 

understanding of the grant requirements, contrary to the financial aid officer’s view.

Faculty felt that some students major in education with an unrealistic view of the teaching profession. 

According to these faculty, students tend to be idealistic about the teaching profession and believe that 

because they like children, they will like teaching. When they begin to work in schools, however, they 

sometimes discover that they do not like teaching and then change their major. If they have received a 

TEACH Grant, changing major can have an unanticipated and negative impact when it converts to a loan. 

Recommendations on TEACH Grant Implementation and Requirements 

The admissions officer said it would help if grant recipients could visit a website that lists districts and 

job openings so that they could have a better sense of the positions available in high-need schools and 

in districts where they would like to work. She said that candidates often want to return to their 

hometowns after graduation and would like to teach in a nearby district, but it is difficult for them to 

target jobs that would allow them to fulfill the grant requirements.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Large, Public Institution in the Southeast

Site Description

This institution is a large, rural public institution in the Southeast, enrolling more than 20,000 students. 

About 10 percent of the institution’s enrollment includes undergraduate and graduate students in the 

college of education. All undergraduate programs are offered only on campus, but most of the master’s 

degree and education specialist programs are offered online only. 

The institution administered approximately 70 percent of its TEACH Grants to undergraduate students, 

with the majority going to juniors and seniors. The institution administered the remaining 30 percent of 

grants to first-year graduate students. Since 2009, there have been about 200 TEACH Grant recipients. 

The grant-to-loan conversion rate stands at 55 percent for this institution.

Staff reported that the institution currently restricts eligibility for TEACH Grants until a student’s junior 

year, which is when they enter the college of education. That decision was made by the college of 

education’s dean, who “had great concerns about offering [the TEACH Grant] too soon because students 

[often] change their majors, and [so as not to] saddle students who do decide ‘teaching maybe isn’t for 

me’ while having then to repay that loan.” 

Administration of TEACH Grants

The financial aid office primarily administers the TEACH Grant, whereas, advisers in the student support 

center inform students about the grants. The advisers in the college of education are tasked with 

counseling students on whether they qualify for a TEACH Grant. 

Qualified students interested in receiving a TEACH Grant complete a form created by the student 

support center, and after the form is approved by the advisers there, it is sent to the institution’s 

financial aid office. Once the office verifies that the student is qualified to receive the grant, it finalizes 

the application and adds the award to the student’s financial aid package. At the end of each school 

year, the student support center and the financial aid office review the grade point average and major of 

each student at or beyond their junior year who are receiving a TEACH Grant. Students are then 

required to reapply for the TEACH Grant for the upcoming school year which is typically for their senior 

year of study.

The student support center advisor stated that every student at the institution is required to meet regularly 

with an advisor, and in the case of education majors, such meetings take place at the student support center. 

At the end of their sophomore year, when education majors are preparing to enroll in education courses, 

advisers talk to those students who qualify about the TEACH Grant and what they need to do to apply. They 

also require students to do their own research before applying for a TEACH Grant. 

The college of education’s application form for the TEACH Grant includes a section that explains the 

requirements of the grant and the responsibilities of students receiving the grant. As part of the 

application process, students then sign that they understand their obligations. If the students have any 

questions, they are told to direct them to the staff at the student support center for assistance with the 

application process and for information about the TEACH Grant.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

63 

The financial aid office runs a report every semester that examines whether a student has changed 

major or has had a drop in grade point average that makes a student ineligible for a TEACH Grant. The 

financial aid office notifies staff in the student support center about any teacher preparation students 

who no longer qualify. The advisers then must provide exit counseling to those students.

Students are required to reapply for the TEACH Grant each semester, which helps advisors monitor their 

continuing eligibility. This also informs the financial aid office of any changes to the list of majors that 

qualify students to receive a TEACH Grant.

Use of TEACH Grants to Recruit and Assist Teacher Candidates 

Institution staff had differing views of the use of TEACH Grants to recruit prospective students into 

teaching. The institution-wide admissions staff member indicated that her office did not use TEACH 

Grants as a recruitment tool, whereas, the student support center did. The director of the student 

support center indicated that the student support advisor served as a part-time recruiter for the college 

of education. The director of the center explained that TEACH Grants were an added financial bonus for 

those students who had committed to teaching after matriculating into the college of education in their 

junior year rather than as a lure to enter the school. 

The college helps teacher candidates meet the grant requirements by immersing them in a variety of 

clinical placements and requiring 1,000 hours of clinical training. In this way, the dean said, candidates 

will inevitably have had experience in the kind of high-need schools that they are required to work in to 

meet the grant requirements.

As students approach the end of their teacher preparation programs, the financial aid office notifies 

TEACH Grant recipients that they need to complete the mandatory, online TEACH Grant exit counseling

required by the Department of Education. 

Job placement and career services are handled in the central career services office under the division of 

student affairs and enrollment management, which serves the entire institution, including the college of 

education. None of the institution’s processes were designed to support efforts by TEACH Grant 

recipients to obtain positions in high-need schools. However, staff who work in career services said that 

representatives from high-need schools and districts often attend the institution's career fairs to recruit 

new teachers. 

TEACH Grant Successes and Challenges

Higher education staff at this institution felt that TEACH Grants helped teacher candidates pay for 

college, thus motivating students to serve in high-need schools. Officials throughout the institution also 

said that placing well-prepared teachers into high-need schools benefits both the community and state, 

especially when the state is facing a teacher shortage.

Administrators and faculty disagreed about whether the college of education should offer TEACH Grants 

to students in their freshman and sophomore years, rather than starting in their junior year. According 

to the Director of the Student Success Center in the college of education, some staff argued that grant 

funds should not be withheld from students and that the grant should be available to all students in the 

education program. At the same time, most officials agreed that offering TEACH Grants to freshmen 

could be unwise since those students are more likely to change majors before entering the college of 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

64 

education, thus incurring substantial debt. Lastly, faculty within the college of education felt that the 

3.25 grade point average requirement was too high. They argued that the requirement prevented some 

good teacher candidates from receiving the grant.

Why TEACH Grants Convert to Loans

The staff did not offer much detail on the reasons for which Grants converted to loans and instead 

reflected on reasons for which teachers leave the profession. For example, the admissions officer felt 

that the recession had led to teacher layoffs and the elimination of some teaching jobs, so graduates 

had a difficult time finding teaching positions. One faculty member explained that many new teachers 

feel isolated and experience a lack of support, so they ultimately leave teaching altogether. One advisor 

thought that some graduates — often finishing their undergraduate degree at age 22 — mistakenly 

think that the eight years to fulfill their obligation to the program is a long time so they can put off 

starting their career, which increases the likelihood of conversion.

Recommendations on TEACH Grant Implementation and Requirements 

Institution officials suggested that modifications to the current TEACH Grant requirements would, in her

view, enable the Grant to reach more students. For example, the faculty emphasized that by lowering 

the grade point average and loosening the service requirements for a short time, federal officials could 

entice more candidates into teaching. Numerous officials at this institution stated that it would be 

helpful to have better data about the graduates whose grants convert to loans to help institution 

officials make better decisions about how to administer the grant. Specifically, they noted that data on 

conversion rates and job placement would be helpful to the institution.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

65 

Small, Private Institution in the South

Site Description

This institution is a rural, relatively small private institution in the south, with an enrollment of slightly 

more than 6,000 students. The college of education enrolls approximately 300 students of whom about 

two-thirds are enrolled in undergraduate programs. The institution administers approximately half of its 

TEACH Grants to undergraduate students. The institution administers the remaining half of TEACH 

Grants to first and second year graduate students. Since 2009, there have been about 500 TEACH Grant 

recipients with a grant-to-loan conversion rate of 65 percent. 

Administration of TEACH Grants

The financial aid office administers TEACH Grants at this institution. The financial aid officer responsible 

for TEACH Grant administration explained that she did not receive any outside training for this role, but 

that her predecessor introduced her to the grant requirements and the administration procedures. 

When students ask about financial aid and if they are planning to major in education and in a high-need 

field, the financial aid office tells them about the TEACH Grant. The financial aid office first verifies their 

eligibility and then asks the students to apply. 

The financial aid officer reported that her office reviews student majors and grade point averages each 

year to make sure students are eligible to receive a TEACH Grant. Moreover, financial aid officers often 

have personal knowledge of which students have TEACH Grants, whereas, faculty and staff in the college 

of education stated that they generally do not know which students are recipients.

The financial aid office uses the college of education’s online counseling tool to help students learn 

about the TEACH Grant requirements. Although students do not enter the college of education until 

their junior year, students can be awarded a TEACH Grant while they are freshmen and sophomores. 

When students are admitted to the college for reasons such as changing majors or are transferring in 

from another institution, their advisors usually mention the TEACH Grant if the student is in an eligible 

field. 

The director of teacher education said she speaks to prospective students about TEACH Grants when 

they visit the institution but that she is careful to tell them and their families about the requirements of 

the TEACH Grant. She informs prospective students that the grants do not cover all majors and can 

convert to loans if the requirements are not met. In addition, faculty who teach in high-need areas 

discuss the TEACH Grants in their courses to students who might qualify.

Use of TEACH Grants to Recruit and Assist Teacher Candidates 

The director of teacher education and faculty often work with the admissions office when groups of 

interested students visit the institution. During these visits, the director talks to those interested in 

teacher education about the TEACH Grant, and she also distributes a brochure with information about 

the grant. If potential students — or their parents — are interested in the TEACH Grant, she directs 

them to the financial aid office to obtain more information. She explained that she does not have data 

on whether the TEACH Grant is an effective tool for recruiting students to either the college of 

education or to a high-need field.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

66 

Because faculty and staff in the college of education do not know which of their students receive TEACH 

Grants, they rely on the students to tell them when they are completing an application, noting their 

preference for field experience in a high-need school. However, the director of field experience noted 

that all their partner K–12 schools are considered high need, so every teacher candidate will have some 

experience teaching in a high-need school.

Staff members said that they remind students, when they are close to completing the teacher 

preparation program, to make sure to complete all the forms for the U.S. Department of Education, 

including the TEACH Grant form. Once students graduate, the institution does not receive information 

about the status of their TEACH Grants. 

TEACH Grant Successes and Challenges

Although staff did not know how to access data about the status of graduates’ TEACH Grants, they felt 

that the TEACH Grant was a good way to incentivize students to major in a high-need field and to 

encourage them to work in a high-need school. 

The financial aid office at this institution noted that tracking varied state lists of what qualifies as a highneed field proved unexpectedly challenging especially since the institution enrolls students from 

throughout the United States. Although the federal government has a list of high-need majors, each 

state can add its own high-need subject areas. The lists change from time to time, and the financial aid 

office finds it challenging to keep up with the changes. For example, one state added “family consumer 

science” as a high-need field. In addition to this, the financial aid officer said it was also challenging to 

monitor every student’s grade point average and major.

Why TEACH Grants Convert to Loans

Despite counseling, the financial aid officer said that freshmen and sophomores sometimes accept a TEACH 

Grant, even though they do not know what they want to choose as a major. They may intend to teach, but 

change their minds a few semesters into their undergraduate education and their grants convert to loans. 

Although the counseling sessions explain the grant requirements, the financial aid officer was uncertain 

whether students fully understand the commitments that TEACH Grant recipients must fulfill to prevent the 

grant from becoming a loan. For example, although recipients receive notices every semester to fill out 

paperwork for the grant some students forget to periodically fulfill the grant obligations.

Staff indicated that students sometimes make decisions about their major based on the needs of their 

home state, where they plan to return after graduation. But students may change their minds about this 

as well, perhaps deciding to live elsewhere or get married and move to their spouse’s home state. The 

staff explained that in both these situations, it is possible that a student’s major no longer qualifies as a 

high-need subject area depending on the state where the candidate takes a teaching position.

The financial aid officer said that students are sometimes so interested in staying out of debt that they 

are eager to take a TEACH Grant because it is a grant, without considering the ramifications of not 

completing the service requirements.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

67 

Recommendations on TEACH Grant Implementation and Requirements 

One staff member said that it would be helpful if the college of education included a question about the 

status of TEACH Grants in the survey the college sends to graduates one year and three years after they

graduate. She noted that it would be helpful if the U.S. Department of Education could somehow 

support and facilitate the efforts of teacher preparation program staff to follow-up with graduates 

about the status of their TEACH Grants. She further commented that lengthening the time in which a 

grant converts to a loan might give students more time to meet grant requirements. Another staff 

member said that she would prefer a program that gave grants to all teacher candidates because it 

would support all those students who are going into this kind of public service. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

68 

Large, Public Institution in the Midwest

Site Description

This institution is a large, rural public institution in the Midwest, with a total enrollment of about 10,000. 

Enrollment in this institution’s teacher preparation programs is high, and it prepares more teachers than 

any other university in the state. The institution primarily serves undergraduate students, but enrolls a 

smaller population of graduate students. Since 2009, about 600 students have been awarded the TEACH 

Grant. The institution administered almost 100 percent of its TEACH Grants to undergraduate students, 

with approximately 30 percent of those grants going to freshman and sophomores and the rest to 

juniors, seniors, and fifth-year seniors. The grant-to-loan conversion rate stands at 45 percent.

Administration of TEACH Grants

The financial aid office is responsible for determining student eligibility for the TEACH Grant and 

communicating with students about the grant requirements. The office enhanced its automated 

processes so that information about a student’s admission into the college of education and the 

information about the TEACH Grant are compiled into one record. Therefore, the grant is automatically 

applied to the financial aid award of students meeting all the TEACH Grant eligibility requirements. 

Financial aid staff stated that the grant does not credit to students’ accounts until students meet with 

them to discuss the rules and requirements of receiving the grant and formally enter the grant program. 

The staff in the financial aid office track the majors and minors eligible for TEACH Grants and 

communicate with the college of education admissions office staff so that they can inform prospective 

students at recruiting events about high-need subject areas related to TEACH Grant eligibility. 

Financial aid staff explained that students are required to meet individually with staff in the institution’s 

financial aid office in person to discuss their financial aid package. During this meeting, students are told 

that to receive a TEACH Grant, they must declare a major in a high-need field, and they are informed 

about which fields qualify as high need. A staff member in the financial aid office explained,

Everyone is required to come in for personal counseling, which takes about 45–60 minutes. 

We give them all the content, and they sign a form, which lists their rights and 

responsibilities.

Students also are informed that they must complete the TEACH Grant agreement to serve and receive 

counseling through the U.S. Department of Education’s website each year to credit the grant to their 

account. 

Staff in the institution’s financial aid office said that they regularly monitor declared academic majors 

and minors of students to ensure that their chosen academic course of study conforms to the list of 

high-need subject areas eligible for the TEACH Grant. Financial aid staff also review each student’s grade 

point average to verify that it meets the requirements for receiving a TEACH Grant. In some cases, that 

means informing a student that he or she is no longer eligible to receive a TEACH Grant, if his or her 

grade point average falls below the required level or if he or she changes the concentration in teacher 

preparation to a non-high-need subject or content area. Financial aid staff indicated that they inform 

students that if they raise their grade point averages or choose an appropriate concentration, they will 

again become eligible for a TEACH Grant.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Use of TEACH Grants to Recruit and Assist Teacher Candidates

The admissions office at the institution holds several events for potential students to learn more about 

the institution and its academic programs. Faculty and staff from every academic unit participate to 

inform recruits about opportunities and programs within the institution. These events for potential 

students typically include high school and community college students. At these events, representatives 

from the college of education introduce the TEACH Grant and its qualification and service requirements. 

Students already enrolled in the institution who may be considering declaring or changing their major or 

minor to education or teaching can attend other recruitment events. The financial aid office created a 

flyer that faculty and admissions staff can use at various recruiting events to provide information on the 

TEACH Grant. Staff at this institution explained that the TEACH Grant is particularly useful in recruiting 

middle class students who may not qualify for need-based financial aid. Because the grant is based on 

meeting service requirements rather than financial need, it is available to students with a broader range 

of backgrounds.

At several points in their teacher training programs, faculty and staff in the college of education provide 

support that can better position teacher candidates to fulfill the TEACH Grant requirements. For 

example, the institution and the college of education require that all education students complete 

several clinical experiences prior to the end of their academic programs that are administered and 

monitored by faculty.

Students enrolled in the college of education and in a teaching major receive guidance from academic 

advisers who handle field placements. They match the placements related to students’ specialization in 

high-need subjects and schools. These placements provide students an opportunity to gain experience 

in areas that would fulfill the TEACH Grant requirements. Students whose majors are outside the college 

of education, in disciplines such as mathematics, and who plan to go into teaching are advised by a 

faculty member in their major about their clinical placements. One faculty member who helps 

coordinate the elementary education program said of the TEACH Grant recipients: “[Students are] 

coached really well along the way to make us aware that they do have a TEACH Grant. That’s important 

for student teaching coordinators to know as they are helping students network for jobs.”

The career services staff also provide experiences for all education students that assist TEACH Grant 

recipients in fulfilling their grant requirements, including a teacher employment fair where all teacher 

preparation students can learn about positions that qualify for fulfillment of the TEACH Grant requirements. 

TEACH Grant Successes and Challenges

Staff at the college of education expressed that they are committed to supporting students at each stage 

of their admission, matriculation, and completion. The associate dean said,

[The institution] really has a mind-set of “students first.” We work hard on getting them 

here, and we work doubly hard on retaining them. We work triply hard on making sure 

they have the right program and get out of here as soon as possible with the least 

amount of debt. 

The dean and others reported that regular communication with students about TEACH Grants explains 

why the institution has a grant-to-loan conversion rate that is below the national average. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

70 

Communication helps students remain aware of the obligations and requirements associated with 

accepting a TEACH Grant. The director of the financial aid office reported that she believes the 

availability of TEACH Grants is particularly important to middle-class students who do not qualify for Pell 

Grants because their parents earn too much to qualify for need-based aid. 

Staff believe that the TEACH Grant is an effective way to recruit teachers into high-need schools and 

fields. According to a coordinator of teacher education,

We have close to 500 students involved in the program that are going into those areas. 

That’s very good for us in [the state]. We like the TEACH Grant. It’s a great program for 

our students.

However, several staff members also commented that the amount of paperwork and procedures required 

to administer the TEACH Grant is burdensome. Moreover, the director of the financial aid office said she 

does not typically have timely and accurate access to information about how students and graduates fare 

with TEACH Grants, which makes it difficult to monitor how the program is working. In addition, she 

explained that the fact that recipients have up to eight years to fulfill the service requirements further 

complicates the office’s ability to collect data to understand how they can improve supports for students. 

Why TEACH Grants Convert to Loans

Faculty and staff noted that the cost of attending the institution continues to increase, and one 

consequence of the rising cost of tuition is that students want to complete their programs in less than 

four years. The director of curriculum and instruction said she is concerned that when students rush 

their preparation, they do not have the opportunity to earn certifications that would allow them to be 

hired into jobs that would fulfill the service requirement. By rushing their training, students may set 

themselves up to have their TEACH Grants convert to loans.

The director of the financial aid office said that although the federally designated high-need subject area 

categories change infrequently, the state high-need subject area categories change more often. 

Consequently, a TEACH Grant recipient who enrolled in a specialized area because it was a high need in 

one year may find that the area is no longer considered high need by the state in the following year. A staff 

member from the career services office echoed this concern, indicating that the key issue for TEACH 

Grantees is to have the right minors and earn endorsements from the state in several high-need areas, in 

case the designated high-need areas change. Paying attention to these changes and being prepared to 

adapt has implications for students in the time needed to complete their programs which may explain why 

some graduates are unable to meet service requirements and have their grants converted to loans.

The institution’s staff indicated that graduates sometimes find that when they enter the workforce and 

take a teaching position in what is designated a high-need field, their actual work ends up being less 

than 50 percent in the high-need field and so it no longer qualifies as high need. This is particularly a 

challenge for students who want to teach in the elementary grades, in which a teacher commonly 

teaches all subjects, not just those classified as high need. The financial aid office director offered an 

example about a teacher who was prepared in K–8 mathematics. 

If they’re planning to be an elementary teacher and get [a TEACH Grant], they have to 

make sure their employment is more than 50 percent in that high-need field. Sometimes 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

71 

that’s out of their control, once they get in that environment...It’s almost like you’re 

buying a faulty car.

In some cases, graduates are unable to find a teaching position in a high-need area. Staff mentioned that 

was more common several years ago, but it still happens. When it does, the TEACH Grant recipient may 

not be able to keep the grant, and it may convert to a loan. 

Various staff noted that some students’ grants convert to loans because they did not file the annual 

service commitment with the U.S. Department of Education once they were in the workforce. They 

believe that graduates sometimes did not realize that they had to report annually even if they were 

working in a high-need field or school, or if they intended to do so within the eight-year service 

requirement window. Some students might simply forget to file once they were in the field. 

Because TEACH Grants can be used for four years, students often begin receiving the grant in their 

freshman year at this institution, before they may be fully committed to becoming a teacher and 

completing the teacher preparation program. A large number freshman at this institution received 

TEACH Grants during the six years prior to the 2015–16 school year. Faculty called the freshmen year a 

period of “discernment,” during which students participate in limited clinical experiences while they are 

learning what it is like to be a teacher. They indicated that although the institution attracts many 

potential teachers because of its reputation for educator preparation, some students may later decide 

that they do not want to be teachers or teach in high-need areas after they have begun accepting TEACH 

Grants. Those students will no longer receive TEACH Grants when their change in major is registered in 

the financial aid database, and the grants will convert to a loan. However, faculty and staff felt that the 

grant-to-loan conversion was higher at other institutions than their own, citing the school’s reputation 

for educator preparation and its ability to attract students with stable aspirations for teaching. 

Recommendations on TEACH Grant Implementation and Requirements 

Faculty and staff at the institution provided some recommendations on how to improve the 

administration and requirements of the TEACH Grant. One staff member said she would like to see the 

grant eligibility expanded to include additional factors to help recruit a more diverse teacher workforce, 

such as students who might be the first in their family to attend college or students from minority 

backgrounds. Another staff member said that given current and projected teacher shortages, expanding 

the TEACH Grant to include other subject areas, such as English language arts, social studies, or the arts, 

might be useful in increasing enrollments in teacher preparation programs. 

Because they viewed the grant as challenging to administer, some institution officials discussed 

implementing changes to simplify the administration process. A financial aid staffer noted that the 

amount of paperwork the financial aid office required to process the TEACH Grant was “cumbersome” 

and suggested implementing more “streamlined” procedures. Several staff said that although aspects of 

the TEACH Grant program were challenging to administer, they agreed overall that it is an important 

program. One staff member said, 

We thoroughly appreciate the money that’s put into this program, and it’s really helped our 

students. It means a lot to the students who are getting it. I know the faculty have some 

great stories, and I want to get some pictures of those teachers and those stories that are 

out in the teaching world, and what this has meant to them. I just want to reiterate: We 

need a program, whether this is the ideal program or not, I don't know that it is.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Large, Proprietary Institution 

Site Description 

This institution is a large, urban proprietary institution, in which the majority of students are enrolled in 

online programs. Of the approximately 70,000 students, about 20 percent take courses on campus; the 

rest are enrolled in online, distance programs. The institution offers several dozen programs in 

education that lead to an undergraduate degree and a teaching certification, along with dozens of 

masters’ level programs. 

The institution administered approximately 50 percent of its TEACH Grants to undergraduate students, 

which are somewhat evenly distributed across freshman, sophomores, juniors, and seniors. The 

remaining 50 percent of grants were allocated to first- and second-year graduate students. Since 2009, 

the institution disbursed approximately 1,000 TEACH Grants, with an estimated grant-to-loan conversion 

rate of 65 percent. The majority of the TEACH Grants recipients are enrolled in the institution’s online 

program and live all over the country.

Administration of TEACH Grants

When potential students contact this institution, they speak with a representative assigned to help them 

through the admissions and enrollment process. The representative asks these potential students about 

their interests and aspirations and then guides them through a net price calculator to compare the cost 

to attend the institution under various parameters (e.g., whether the student will enroll full-time versus 

part-time and whether the student will access private loans or federal aid). If the student expresses 

interest in teaching in a high-need field and meets the requirements for the TEACH Grant, a pricing 

calculator auto-populates the TEACH Grant as a financial aid option, and the counselor may discuss the 

grant with students. After interested students apply and are admitted to the institution, they are again 

contacted by the enrollment representative or their assigned student service advisor to discuss financial 

requirements and processes, including for the TEACH Grant. If interested in the TEACH Grant, the student 

would then fill out a financial aid form. The process of applying for a TEACH Grant is entirely online. 

Students can go to a website, get the information, complete the forms, and submit their application. 

After a student enrolls in the institution, a student services advisor replaces the online counseling role, 

at 21 days after the student begins taking classes. Each student has a mandatory appointment with the 

advisor every semester. Student services advisors then inform students about the requirements 

associated with the TEACH Grants. 

The financial aid office monitors the student’s aid package, grade point average, and major to determine 

eligibility for TEACH Grants. According to financial aid staff, 

Our job is to help the [student services advisors] know what they’re doing when they talk 

to students about it.

The financial aid office provides training and materials to other departments administering TEACH 

Grants, including the student services advisors. Because the definition of a high-need subject area varies 

from state to state, the proportion of students receiving TEACH Grants varies by state, which means 

some student service advisors — depending on the geographic area they cover — have more students 

receiving TEACH Grants than other advisers. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

73 

Use of TEACH Grants to Recruit and Assist Teacher Candidates 

At this institution, TEACH Grants are not used to recruit students into the institution or into the college 

of education. Instead, TEACH Grants are presented to students who indicate they are interested in 

teaching, in a specialty area that is eligible for a TEACH Grant.

The student services advisors and the financial aid office reported that they monitor students’ eligibility 

to receive a TEACH Grant, which may change over time. The director of clinical placement said that the 

student services adviser is required to monitor a student’s program of study in relation to TEACH Grant 

requirements. College of education staff indicated that they also oversee the eligibility requirements for 

each state, in relation to the programs of study undertaken by online students. The director said that 

faculty and staff in the college of education work with various departments in the institution to inform 

them of the requirements and ensure that students learn about the requirements. However, the 

director of clinical practice said that students — particularly online students — are responsible for 

making sure their clinical placements are aligned to the high-need subject for their state. 

TEACH Grant Successes and Challenges

Staff at the institution felt that TEACH Grants were a benefit for students to cover the cost of college and 

were serving a need in education overall. Multiple staff mentioned the institution’s net price calculator 

was an effective tool in counseling students to make financially responsible decisions about funding 

their education, including their decision on whether to accept the TEACH Grant. 

Several staff members said that it is difficult to coordinate a student’s course of study when the statelevel high-need subject areas change annually, especially given the institution’s number of online 

recipients spread throughout the country. The director of clinical placements said that the varied list of 

high-need subjects and certification requirements in different states made it difficult to ensure that 

online students were meeting the local requirements to become a teacher. For example, some states 

are now using edTPA, a portfolio-based assessment that requires candidates to provide a packet of their 

teaching work along with a video of their teaching, as the licensure examination. Other states use 

standardized, multiple-choice tests for licensure, and still other states have created their own licensure 

examinations. The variety of licensure assessment means the college of education needs to coordinate 

with states where their students reside so that the teacher candidates are adequately prepared to pass 

local licensure examinations. 

Why TEACH Grants Convert to Loans

Several staff members stated that freshmen and sophomores often change majors as they progress 

through college. The financial aid officer said,

You’re 18 to 22 years old, and you don’t really know what you want to do. There’s a lot 

of changes in life at that time.

Students who received TEACH Grants early in their education programs before switching to an ineligible 

major would have the grant convert to a loan. Staff indicated that some students withdraw from the 

institution after a year or two, and these students would have TEACH Grants convert to loans. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

74 

The financial aid office recently began analyzing data on students whose grants converted to loans but 

does not yet have any information showing patterns or trends. The financial aid officer believed that 

some students did not pay attention to the information they received about TEACH Grants when they 

went online to learn about and apply for a grant. The financial aid officer also felt that students took the 

TEACH Grant because they saw it as a way to reduce college costs, without thinking about the teaching 

job they would have to take to fulfill the service requirements or consciously treating the grant as a loan.

In addition, one staff member thought that there might be a disconnect between the time students 

graduate and the time they are required to certify that they were fulfilling the service requirements, and 

students either did not realize they had to submit a form or forget to do so. Lastly, staff reported that 

students and graduates sometimes move to a different state where the subject areas under the TEACH 

Grant are different, thus causing grants to convert to loans since the graduate is no longer able to meet 

the service requirements if he or she moves.

Recommendations on TEACH Grant Implementation and Requirements 

The financial aid officer explained that eliminating the state-level high-need subject areas in favor of 

federal high-need areas would be helpful in coordinating majors and placements for students, especially 

those in the online program.

Several staff members suggested modifying the structure of the grant. According to the dean, the name 

TEACH Grant implies that it is not a loan program, which sets up assumptions on the part of students. 

One official suggested awarding the grant on a prorated scale based on a student’s grade level. For example, 

because freshman and sophomores have more time to change their minds about teaching, recipients in 

those grades would receive a smaller grant, whereas, juniors and seniors, who are closer to becoming 

certified teachers, would receive a larger grant. In addition, he suggested forgiving the grant based on 

the number of years served. In this case, a TEACH Grant recipient who completed three of the four years 

of service in a high-need field would have only 25 percent of his or her grant converted to a loan.

One staff member recommended implementing better communication procedures with students after 

graduation, to help remind them to submit their annual forms if they are in the process of completing 

the grant requirements. Another recommendation was to have districts note on job postings if a position is 

in a TEACH Grant-eligible school and subject area to enable students to easily locate eligible positions.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

75 

Large, Public Institution in the West

Site Description

This institution is a large, urban public institution enrolling nearly 30,000 students. About 75 percent of 

the students are in state, and most of the remaining students come from neighboring states. The 

institution serves both undergraduate and graduate students. The institution administered the majority 

of its TEACH Grants to graduate students, with approximately 20 percent of the grants going to 

undergraduates. Since 2009, there have been about 1,000 TEACH Grant recipients with a loan-toconversion rate of about 70 percent.

At this institution, students cannot earn a teaching credential when they receive a baccalaureate 

degree, so the college of education does not enroll undergraduate students. All students in the college 

of education are graduate students seeking a teaching credential. The institution offers several majors 

and minors in the college of liberal arts and sciences that are for students seeking to continue into 

graduate school to become teachers. The TEACH Grant is offered to eligible students who are 

undergraduates or graduate students pursuing teaching.

Administration of TEACH Grants

The institution’s financial office handles administration of the TEACH Grant. The financial aid counselor 

reported that after a student receives admission to the institution, the student can work with the 

financial aid office to develop a student-specific package of financial aid. Those whose major and other 

credentials meet the requirements for the TEACH Grant are offered the grant as part of their aid package. 

The financial aid counselor said that as soon as the student indicates an interest in teaching, institution 

officials inquire about grade point average and major so they can offer the student a TEACH Grant.

The financial aid counselor also explained that students receiving a TEACH Grant are required to 

participate in an online counseling session every year they receive a grant. The teacher pathways 

coordinator said she informs students and prospective students with an eligible major about the TEACH 

Grant, and she emphasizes the grant requirements. She said she urges these students to become 

educated about the TEACH Grant obligations before accepting the grant. She also suggests to freshmen 

and sophomores that they take some courses about teaching and participate in field experience 

activities before they commit to teaching and the obligations associated with the TEACH Grant. She 

went on to explain that if students are unsure about taking the grant, she suggests that if it is a choice 

between an unsubsidized loan or the TEACH Grant, they should take the grant. She stated,

Some students perhaps do not understand the obligations that accompany a TEACH Grant, but if 

they sign the agreement and say they have no questions and are eligible, there is nothing the 

financial aid office can do.

Use of TEACH Grants to Recruit and Assist Teacher Candidates 

Financial aid officers attend college fairs and conduct welcome orientations. At these events, they hand 

out a federal loan flyer that describes all kinds of federal financial aid available to prospective students. 

The TEACH Grant is included on the flyers, and the flyer and other TEACH Grant information is available 

on the institution website.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

76 

The dean of education said that because the college of education has close partnerships with nearby 

districts, along with a commitment to preparing teachers for high-need schools, support for new 

teachers to meet the grant requirements is built into the school and the curriculum. The dean said that 

his faculty have a secondary motivation — because the school has received national accreditation, it 

must make preparing and placing graduates in high-need schools a priority to meet national 

accreditation standards.

TEACH Grant Successes and Challenges

The dean reported that the TEACH Grant is well aligned with the school’s goals because it is seeking a 

diverse enrollment. Almost two-thirds of students are first-generation college students, and they often 

require financial aid to afford college. The TEACH Grant is an attractive aid option because it is a grant, 

and if students fulfill the requirements, they do not have to pay it back. 

School faculty and staff stated that they do not know of a way to track their graduates to support them 

after graduation. They also do not have information about available jobs, although the dean said the 

state has a website with employment opportunities. 

Why TEACH Grants Convert to Loans

The financial aid counselor said she was not sure why grants convert to loans; she only has had two 

students call the office after graduation with concerns about why the grant was going to convert. In one 

case, it was because the school where the graduate was working was not considered as high need. In 

the other case, an error in the reporting of the graduate’s date of graduation was corrected.

The dean said that the job market in the last few years made it difficult for graduates to get a job. 

Schools were laying off teachers, and new teachers had trouble finding work. Other staff said that 

because the federal and state identification of high-need subjects changes with some regularity, 

graduates might find that they are not prepared to teach in a subject that qualifies. Staff speculated that 

in a few cases, graduates may not be fully aware of what it will be like to work as a full-time teacher, or 

perhaps the environment in which they are working is not a good fit for them. In those cases, it is 

possible that graduates simply leave teaching and therefore not meeting the TEACH Grant requirements. 

According to the teacher pathway coordinator, some students take the money knowing it will eventually 

convert to a loan, but they need it at the time to pay for their education. She mentioned that because 

the college of education and TEACH Grant primarily serve graduate students at the institution, many 

forego working full time and have families to support, so they need as much financial aid as possible. 

Many reach their loan limits, so they use the TEACH Grant to supplement their financial aid and do not 

care about the grant converting to a loan because they would have taken a loan anyway.

Recommendations on TEACH Grant Implementation and Requirements 

The dean said it would be helpful if there were a way to track their graduates. He said the state has 

already begun to work on a process for that, but 20 percent of the institution’s graduates leave the state 

to teach. If the federal government could help track graduates, that would help the college of education 

obtain data and support graduates. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

77 

Appendix C. Data Sources, Data Collection Activities, 

Data Processing, and Analysis Methods

Data for this study were derived from several sources: extant data, the Institution of Higher Education 

(IHE) Survey, the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, and qualitative interviews with institutional staff. This 

appendix describes the various data sources, the procedures for collecting and processing these data, 

and the analysis methods used to address the research questions.

Data Sources

Extant Data 

Extant data were gathered from the Federal Student Aid National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) 

and the TEACH Grant servicer, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency (PHEAA). These 

extant files were used in combination to identify eligible institutions for the qualitative interviews, 

establish the target populations for the IHE Survey and the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, and serve as a 

source of data included in the analyses.

The PHEAA file contained data on 258,960 grants awarded to 138,286 recipients from 2008 (the 

inception of the program) through the 2015–16 award year as of June 2016. The data elements included 

the recipient, the institution awarding the grant, the academic level of the recipient, the award date and 

amount, the date that service obligation period began (based on when students separate from their 

institution), the current status (e.g., loan conversion), and the conversion date. 

In order to examine conversion rates for an appropriate group of TEACH Grant recipients (that is, those 

that had either completed or withdrawn from the postsecondary program for which they received the 

TEACH Grant), we removed grants and recipients that did not meet certain criteria from the dataset. 

First, we removed 113,405 grants awarded to 59,562 recipients that had a start obligation date on or 

after July 1, 2014, resulting in a data file with 145,555 grants awarded to 78,724 recipients.20 We also

removed 893 recipients that had one or more grants recorded in the PHEAA file with a current status of 

“death,” “disability,” “canceled,” or “life circumstance.” This data file was merged with the NSLDS file, 

which provided demographic information on each grant recipient as of August 2015.

21 

The resulting data file containing 77,831 recipients and 78,623 records was used in this report’s extant 

data analysis to calculate grant-to-loan conversion rates among various segments of the recipient 

population.22 Recipients with one or more grants with a current status of “loan” were designated as 

 

20 Records that were missing a service obligation start date (approximately 8,500 records) were not removed because the 

missing date likely indicated that their grant had been converted to a loan prior to the 2013 transition between federal loan 

servicers managing the grant.

21 Due to limitations in data transfer during the transition, about 5,000 NSLDS records of TEACH Grant recipients who converted 

or satisfied their grants in full prior to the transition did not have corresponding records in the PHEAA data; these recipients 

were excluded from the merged file because of the lack of data regarding their current conversion status. 

22 Note that the unit of analysis for the conversion rate analysis is based on records rather than recipients. Each record 

represents a unique combination of recipient and institution, and recipients that received awards from multiple institutions 

would have more than one record. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

78 

“recipients in loan status” for the purpose of this analysis, and the remaining recipients were designated 

as “recipients in grant status.”23

IHE Survey

The IHE Survey conducted for this study was a universe survey of all 472 institutions that awarded TEACH 

Grants to at least 10 recipients during the 2014–15 award year, according to data from the Federal Student 

Aid Title IV Grant Volume Report for academic year 2014–15 as of July 2015. These 472 institutions 

accounted for 95 percent of all grant recipients for that year (out of the 788 institutions that awarded grants). 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey

The sampling frame for the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey was based on the 77,831 recipients in the 

data file described in the Extant Data section above. In order to provide a suitable sampling frame for 

administering this survey, we removed 14,808 recipients from the frame for the following reasons:

• Recipients who received grants at institutions that awarded grants to fewer than 10 students in 

2014–15, because these institutions were not examined in the survey component of this study 

(approximately 7,000 recipients). 

• Recipients for which we were not able to obtain reliable contact information through an initial 

query of PHEAA databases (approximately 8,000 recipients).

24 

The resulting sampling frame of 63,023 recipients contained 37,131 recipients whose grants had been 

converted to loans (i.e., recipients in loan status) and 25,892 recipients who had already completed or 

were in the process of completing the grant requirements (i.e., recipients in grant status).

The actual TEACH Grant Recipient Survey sample included 500 total recipients: 250 recipients in loan 

status and 250 recipients in grant status. The study aimed to achieve a 70 percent response rate for both 

halves of the sample to have power to detect differences between these two groups at a 90 percent 

confidence level. The TEACH Grant Recipient Survey sample design included three-level stratification:

• Grant-to-loan conversion status

– Service requirements either completed or in progress (i.e., recipients in grant status) 

– Loan conversion (i.e., recipients in loan status) 

• Sector of institution that awarded first TEACH Grant

– Public

– Private-nonprofit

– Proprietary

 

23 A very small number of recipients had some but not all grants converted to loans.

24 An analysis of the demographic characteristics of these records from the NSLDS indicated that these excluded records were 

generally representative of the entire population of recipients, with the exception of the timeframe of loan conversion.

Specifically, those who did not have contact information tended to be those who converted prior to the transition of 

servicers in 2013. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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• Geographical region of the institution25 that awarded the first TEACH Grant26

– Northeast (Connecticut, District of Columbia, Delaware, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, 

New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia)

– Southeast (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, 

Puerto Rico, South Carolina, and Tennessee)

– Midwest (Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, 

Nebraska, New Hampshire,27 Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin)

– Southwest (Arkansas, Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas)

– West (Alaska, California, Colorado, Guam, Hawaii, Idaho, Northern Mariana Islands, Nevada, 

Oregon, Utah, and Washington)

The geographic region indicator was merged into the recipient survey sample frame from the institution 

universe file provided by the Department. To ensure at least two cases in each stratum, the Southwest 

and West regions were collapsed, resulting in four regions. The sample design resulted in 22 strata 

because no proprietary institutions in the Northeast were represented in the study. Exhibit C1 shows the 

distribution of the sample frame across those 22 strata.

 

25 The geographic region of the institution is based on the location of main campus of an institution; however, institutions may

have satellite campuses in other locations and/or enroll a significant number of distance education students who could be in 

any region (or even outside the United States).

26 Four states (Montana, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wyoming) are not listed because no institutions from those four states 

were in the study universe.

27 New Hampshire was included in the Midwest region in error. Only one institution with 100 total recipients from 2008 to 2014 

was misclassified, and only one of these recipients was selected for the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey sample. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C1. Number and percentage of survey sample frame, by strata: 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey

Conversion status School type Region Frequency Percentage

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit Midwest 3,555 13.73

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit Northeast 1,720 6.64

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit Southeast 2,291 8.85

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit West 3,400 13.13

Recipients in grant status Proprietary Midwest 770 2.97

Recipients in grant status Proprietary Southeast 14 0.05

Recipients in grant status Proprietary West 1,453 5.61

Recipients in grant status Public Midwest 3,618 13.97

Recipients in grant status Public Northeast 1,717 6.63

Recipients in grant status Public Southeast 2,290 8.84

Recipients in grant status Public West 5,064 19.56

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit Midwest 4,301 11.58

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit Northeast 2,693 7.25

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit Southeast 3,036 8.18

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit West 5,319 14.32

Recipients in loan status Proprietary Midwest 1,096 2.95

Recipients in loan status Proprietary Southeast 36 0.10

Recipients in loan status Proprietary West 2,509 6.76

Recipients in loan status Public Midwest 4,835 13.02

Recipients in loan status Public Northeast 3,283 8.84

Recipients in loan status Public Southeast 3,015 8.12

Recipients in loan status Public West 7,008 18.87
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C2 presents the distribution of the selected sample across the 22 strata.

Exhibit C2. Number and percentage of selected survey sample, by strata: 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey

Conversion status School type Region Frequency Percentage

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit Midwest 34 13.6

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit Northeast 16 6.4

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit Southeast 22 8.8

Recipients in grant status Private-nonprofit West 33 13.2

Recipients in grant status Proprietary Midwest <10 <5

Recipients in grant status Proprietary Southeast <10 <5

Recipients in grant status Proprietary West 14 5.6

Recipients in grant status Public Midwest 35 14.0

Recipients in grant status Public Northeast 16 6.4

Recipients in grant status Public Southeast 22 8.8

Recipients in grant status Public West 49 19.6

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit Midwest 29 11.6

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit Northeast 18 7.2

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit Southeast 20 8.0

Recipients in loan status Private-nonprofit West 36 14.4

Recipients in loan status Proprietary Midwest <10 <5

Recipients in loan status Proprietary Southeast <10 <5

Recipients in loan status Proprietary West 17 6.8

Recipients in loan status Public Midwest 32 12.8

Recipients in loan status Public Northeast 22 8.8

Recipients in loan status Public Southeast 20 8.0

Recipients in loan status Public West 47 18.8

Qualitative Interviews with Institution Staff

As indicated in the main body of the report, a nonrepresentative sample was selected, of nine 

institutions with a range of characteristics, conditions, and outcomes at which interviews would be 

conducted to inform the research questions. The following criteria were used to select the sample:

• Number of TEACH Grants awarded. The sample included institutions that awarded TEACH 

Grants to at least 10 recipients in the 2014–15 award year and more than 100 grants before 

July 1, 2014 (178 institutions met this criterion).

• Geographic region. The sample included institutions across five geographic regions. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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• Distance learning. The sample included one institution classified as a distance-learning 

institution, which is defined as 75 percent or more of the students enrolled in distance 

education coursework. 

• Sector. The sample included five public institutions, three private institutions, and one 

proprietary institution.

• TEACH Grant-to-loan conversion rates. The sample included institutions with both higher and 

lower percentages of TEACH Grants that converted to loans. The average grant-to-loan 

conversion rate for the population of 178 institutions that met the first criterion for inclusion 

was 56 percent. The nine-site sample included four institutions with rates at or above the 

average and five below the average. Grant-to-loan conversion rates ranged from approximately 

40 percent to 70 percent. 

• Academic levels of the TEACH Grant recipients. The sample included institutions that 

administered TEACH Grants to students at various academic levels in their institution enrollment 

(e.g., freshman year, senior year, or graduate level).

After the first six institutions were selected based on these criteria; three additional institutions were 

selected that administered fewer than 100 TEACH Grants with lower than average grant-to-loan 

conversion rates. The Technical Working Group members indicated that institutions administering small 

numbers of grants may do so deliberately and have different responses to questions related to 

implementation. In lieu of site visits, phone interviews were conducted with deans and financial aid 

officers from these three institutions. 

Exhibit C3 lists the interviewed institutions by key factors and displays the data used to select the sample.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C3. Case study institutions, by geographic region, sector, number of recipients, grant-to-loan

conversion rates, distance learning, and freshmen and sophomores receiving grants 

(2009–2014)

Institution Region

Relative size 

of TEACH 

Grant 

program

Grant-toloan 

conversion 

rate 

(percentage)

Distance 

learning 

(percentage)

Undergraduates first 

receiving grant as 

freshmen or 

sophomores 

(percentage)

Small, private institution Northeast Medium 60 — 60

Large, private institution Southeast Medium 55 0 40

Large, public institution Midwest Large 45 <25 40

Small, private institution Southwest Large 65 <25 50

Large, proprietary 

institution 

Distance 

learning

Large 65 >75 60

Large, public institution West Large 70 — 40

Small, private institution Northeast Medium 60 0 70

Medium, public 

institution

Midwest Medium 50 <25 10

Medium, public 

institution

Southeast Small 40 <25 30

Note: — Indicates that data were unavailable. Numbers were rounded to mask the identity of each site. The relative sizes of the TEACH Grant 

program are defined as small being fewer than 100 recipients, medium being between 100 and 300 recipients, and large being more than 300 

recipients in the 2009–2014 combined cohort.

Source: Federal Student Aid National Student Loan Data System, award year 2014–15; Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, 2014–15
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Data Collection Activities

Questionnaire Design

The IHE Survey focused on the institutional goals of the TEACH Grant, the institutional units or 

departments that are responsible for administering the grants, and the specific roles (e.g., counseling

students about the program and providing job placement services) that each unit performs. Because of 

the information that respondents may have needed to gather from institutional colleagues, the 

estimated average completion time for this survey was about 60 minutes. The TEACH Grant Recipient 

Survey mainly asked about how informed recipients were about the program requirements at various 

points in their education, how influential the program was in their career pursuit decisions, and which 

factors influenced the likelihood of completing the service requirements of the program. The estimated 

average completion time for the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey was about 10 minutes.

Both questionnaires were not tested prior to being fielded due to the compressed schedule from 

development to deployment of the questionnaires. Both questionnaires were originally designed as 

hard-copy, paper instruments; to enable a mixed-mode data collection through online and paper modes, 

the structure and skip logic of many items (mostly in the IHE Survey) were modified to be compatible 

with survey data collection software. For example, the IHE Survey contained a series of items that 

looped through a “grid” question for each unit or department. In the online survey, one “mark-all-thatapply” filter question determined which units or departments were relevant to the respondent, whereas 

in the paper survey, separate yes or no filter questions about each unit or department appeared before 

each grid question. The questionnaires for both surveys, as adapted for online administration, can be 

found in Appendix D.

Survey Operations

IHE Survey

On May 31, 2016, the survey invitation letters were sent by U.S. Postal Service first-class mail on U.S. 

Department of Education letterhead. This letter was addressed to the Federal Aid Administrator at each 

selected institution, based on information provided to NSLDS by the Postsecondary Education 

Participants System as of January 2016. Each invitation letter included a personalized URL to the online 

survey for the institution. Five reminder emails were sent to those Federal Aid Administrators who had 

not yet responded by the dates indicated in Exhibit C4. The reminder email on August 3, 2016, was sent 

by the project officer at the Department; all other reminder emails were sent by the study team at AIR. 

A paper questionnaire was sent by first-class mail to 306 nonrespondents on July 1, 2016. From July 7 

through July 26, 2016, telephone calls were placed to nonresponding Federal Aid Administrators to 

verify that they had received the study information and remind them to complete the survey. During 

this period, nonrespondents received up to eight call attempts, with a median of five. During this 

telephone calling effort, about 40 institutions were identified for which the contact person invited to 

complete the survey was incorrect, and the new contact person was subsequently invited by email to 

complete the survey. Survey data collection closed on August 31, 2016. See Appendix D for all invitation 

and reminder materials sent to sample members. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C4. Number of sample members receiving survey contact attempts, number

of sample members responding after each contact attempt, and

the cumulative response rate after each contact attempt: IHE Survey

Date (2016) Contact method

Number 

receiving 

contact

Number 

responding 

after contact

Cumulative response 

rate after contact

(percentage)

May 31 Advance notification and survey invitation letter 

(sent by the Department)

472 14 3.0

June 7 First reminder email 458 74 18.6

June 14 Second reminder email 384 76 34.7

June 28 Third reminder email 308 48 44.9

July 1 Paper questionnaire maileda 306 a a

July 7–26 Telephone reminder calls 259 95 65.0

August 3 Fourth reminder email (sent by the Department) 140 32 71.8

August 24 Final reminder email 105 6 73.1

a

Response from the paper questionnaire mailing is not shown because of the overlap with the telephone contact period that immediately 

followed.

On June 6, 2016, it was discovered that the IHE Survey contained a programming error that resulted in a 

loss of respondent data for questions A11–A15. The programming error was corrected on June 13, 2016. 

Eighty-seven respondents had completed the survey before this error was corrected, and 64 of these 

completed surveys were affected by the error. 

To collect these missing data, the 64 respondents affected by the programming error were contacted by 

email, inviting them to complete a short follow-up survey to “validate [their] responses.” The text of this 

email invitation is found in Appendix D. The questionnaire included the original IHE Survey questions 

that were affected by the programming error and the original question numbers; in addition, question 

A10 was included to determine which of questions A11–A15 each respondent would be asked. Most 

respondents to this follow-up survey were asked only three questions. Two reminder emails were sent 

to nonrespondents, and telephone follow-up calls were made to respondents who had not yet 

completed the follow-up survey. These people were offered the opportunity to take a few minutes and 

complete the follow-up survey by telephone. Ultimately, 58 of the 64 original respondents 

(90.6 percent) completed the follow-up survey to capture the missing data from questions A11–A15.

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey

On June 27, 2016, the advance notification letters were sent by first-class mail on U.S. Department of 

Education letterhead to all recipient survey sample members. The survey invitation letters were mailed to all 

recipient survey sample members by first-class mail on July 6, 2016; this letter also included the URL to the 

online survey, a participant ID to log into the survey, and a prepaid $10 Amazon gift card as a token of 

appreciation. Three reminder emails were sent to all nonrespondents on the dates shown in Exhibit C5. A 

paper questionnaire was sent by first-class mail to 306 nonrespondents on July 25, 2016. From July 29 

through August 15, 2016, telephone calls were placed to 289 nonresponding recipient survey sample 

members to verify that they had received the study information and remind them to complete the survey; 

during this period, sample members received a maximum of eight call attempts, with a median of four. See 

Appendix D for all invitation and reminder materials sent to the sample members.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C5. Number of sample members receiving survey contact attempts, number of sample 

members responding after each contact attempt, and the cumulative response rate 

after each contact attempt, by grant-to-loan conversion strata: Recipient Survey

Date (2016)

Contact 

method

Recipients in grant status strata Recipients in loan status strata

Number 

receiving 

contact

Number 

responding 

after contact

Cumulative 

response 

rate after 

contact

(percentage)

Number 

receiving 

contact

Number 

responding 

after 

contact

Cumulative 

response 

rate after 

contact 

(percentage)

July 6 Survey 

invitation letter 

with incentive

250 30 12.0 250 16 6.4

July 12 First reminder 

email

220 68 39.2 234 31 18.8

July 18 Second 

reminder email

152 40 55.2 203 27 29.6

July 25 Paper 

questionnaire 

maileda

122 a a 184 a a

July 29–August 

15

Telephone 

reminder calls

112 43 72.4 177 25 39.6

August 16 Third reminder 

email

62 14 78.0 144 11 44.0

August 26 Reminder 

postcard 

maileda

— — — 133 a a

August 29–

September 16

Telephone 

reminder calls

— — — 131 17 50.8

— = not applicable. a Response from the paper questionnaire and postcard mailings is not shown because of the overlap with the telephone contact periods that 

immediately followed.

As of August 24, 2016, the response rate for recipients in grant status had reached 75 percent, whereas 

the response rate for Recipients in loan status was only 44 percent. Therefore, the remaining 

nonresponse follow-up efforts were limited to recipients in loan status. These efforts included a 

reminder postcard to 133 recipients in loan status nonrespondents sent by first-class mail on August 26, 

2016, followed by a second telephone contact period from August 29 through September 16, 2016; 

these follow-up attempts employed messaging that responding to the survey was important “regardless 

of whether grants had been converted to loans.” During this second telephone reminder period, 

nonrespondents received a maximum of four call attempts, with a median of two.

Not all recipients had accurate contact information from the PHEAA, which required additional effort to 

locate up-to-date contact information. During the telephone prompting efforts, interviewers identified 

33 sample members (24 of whom were recipients in loan status) with incorrect or unusable telephone 

numbers. For sample members that had not successfully contacted by telephone, free Internet 

resources (e.g., White Pages and Pipl.com) or paid locating databases (e.g., Accurint and Satori) were 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

87 

used to attempt to locate them. Updated contact information was obtained from PHEAA for 

44 recipients in loan status in late August. In total, new contact information was obtained for 

112 sample members, 86 of which were recipients in loan status. Of these 112 sample members with 

new information, 16 ultimately completed the survey; nine of the 16 were recipients in loan status. 

Survey data collection for the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey closed on September 26, 2016.

Final Dispositions and Response Rates 

IHE Survey 

For the IHE Survey, a “complete” was defined as all questions having been asked (as appropriate based 

on skip logic) and the respondent answered at least one question. Therefore, surveys in which 

respondents stopped in the middle and were not asked all the questions (i.e., a partial survey) were 

considered incomplete. Of the 472 institutions invited to participate, 345 institutions completed the 

survey, consisting of 324 online surveys and 21 paper surveys. Response rates were calculated using 

response rate 1 from the American Association for Public Opinion Research (2015): dividing the number 

of completes by the number of all eligible sample cases. To be eligible, an institution had to have

awarded TEACH Grants to at least 10 recipients in the 2014–15 academic year. No ineligible sample 

members were identified because the universe was established with known eligibility and therefore the 

response rate was calculated as the number of complete surveys divided by the sample size. The final 

response rate to the IHE Survey was 73 percent. 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey 

For the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, a “complete” was defined as all questions having been asked (as 

appropriate based on skip logic) and the respondent answered at least one question. Therefore, surveys 

in which respondents stopped in the middle and were not asked all the questions (i.e., a partial survey) 

were considered incomplete. Of the 500 sampled recipients, 322 completed surveys were received, of 

which 296 were completed online, and 26 were completed on paper. As with the IHE Survey, response 

rates were calculated using AAPOR response rate 1. The eligibility criteria were to have (1) received a 

TEACH Grant between 2008 and 2014 from one of the 472 institutions included in the study and 

(2) started the service obligation period prior to July 1, 2014. No ineligible sample members were 

identified because the starting sample was drawn from known eligibility. The final overall response rate 

to the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey was 64 percent. The response rate among recipients in grant status

was 78 percent. The response rate among recipients in loan status was 51 percent.

Qualitative Interview Data Collection Activities

To answer questions about how institutions administer TEACH Grants and to investigate reasons and 

factors associated with whether TEACH Grant recipients were meeting or not meeting the grant 

requirements, site visits were conducted at six of nine institutions and telephone interviews with the 

three additional institutions. Site visits consisted of interviews with deans of education, teaching 

program coordinators, field placement coordinators, job placement counselors, financial aid officers, 

and other institutional staff involved in the administration of the grant. To identify interviewees, deans 

of education and financial aid directors were contacted to identify additional staff involved in TEACH 

Grant administration and serving in counseling and placement roles. Exhibit C6 includes the number and 

types of interviews conducted by site.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C6. Number of interviews by protocol type and institution

Institution (total 

number of 

institutional staff 

interviewed) Dean

Financial 

aid Recruitment Admissions Counseling 

Student 

teaching or 

field 

placement

Job 

placement

Large, public 

institution in the 

Midwest

X X X X X X X 

Large, private 

institution in the 

Southeast

X X X X X X X 

Large, 

proprietary 

institution 

X X X X X 

Small, private 

institution in the 

Southwest 

X X X X X 

Large, public 

institution in the 

West

X X X X X 

Small, private 

institution in the 

Northeast

X X X X 

Small, private 

institution in the 

Northeast

X X X 

Medium, public 

institution in the 

Midwest

X X 

Medium, public 

institution in the 

Southeast

X 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Protocol Development

Semistructured interview protocols were developed for each respondent group. The protocols consisted 

of open-ended questions, aligned with the research questions, intended to gather contextual, in-depth 

information about TEACH Grant administration. The protocol questions and probes investigated how 

institutions implemented the grant across varying institution departments and actors, as well as how 

institution policies and practices contributed to successful grant fulfillment or high grant-to-loan 

conversion rates. The protocol questions and probes were designed to elicit information about challenges 

and best practices associated with grant administration and fulfillment of the grant requirements. 

Conducting Interviews

To prepare for each visit and facilitate and streamline the interviews with respondents, site visit teams 

reviewed the key features of the site and its TEACH Grant program, as well as relevant information from 

institution websites (such as teacher education program recruitment materials, TEACH Grant 

informational materials, and other program- or policy-related documents). The teams annotated each 

section of the individual interview protocols accordingly. These annotated notes were used to tailor the 

wording of each question, as appropriate. The use of experienced interviewers, coupled with careful 

preparation, ensured that the interviews were not “canned” or overly formal. When possible, both 

members of each site visit team attended all interviews. In some instances, site visitors conducted 

interviews separately when schedules did not permit both visitors to participate in the same interviews. 

In addition, each interview was audio recorded and transcribed with permission from the respondents. 

Data Management

After completing each site visit, the site visit team members saved audio recordings to a secure file server. 

One member of the study team was responsible for maintaining the files and sent the files for transcription. 

Quality Control

The case study data collection process used the following quality control procedures: (1) weekly site visit 

debriefings among the team to identify and problem-solve logistical and data collection concerns; (2) a 

formal tracking system to ensure that the teams were collecting the required data from each site; and 

(3) adherence to the timely cleaning and posting of interview notes and written observations, as well as 

interview audio transcripts, to a secure project website for task leaders to check for completeness and 

consistency.

Data Processing

Weighting Adjustments

Base Weights

Because the IHE Survey was a universe survey (all 472 eligible institutions were sampled for the survey), the 

base weight for all cases was 1. In contrast, the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey used a stratified sample (as 

described earlier in this appendix). Five hundred recipients from approximately 63,000 eligible recipients 

were selected into the sample. The base weight for each case was calculated as follows:

BBBBhii = NNh

nnh

where BWhi is the base weight, nh is the number of sampled cases in stratum h, and, Nh is the total 

number of cases in stratum h.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Nonresponse Bias Analysis and Nonresponse Weighting Adjustments

Nonresponses occurred in both the IHE Survey and the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey (as described 

previously). Two types of nonresponses could occur. Unit nonresponse refers to the fact that not all 

sampled units responded to the survey, whereas item nonresponse could occur when units that 

responded to the survey but did not provide responses to some items. Only unit response is evaluated 

here; no adjustments were made to account for item nonresponse. The term nonresponse represents 

unit nonresponse.

Nonresponse can be dangerous to the accuracy of survey estimates if any difference in the outcome 

variable exists between respondents and nonrespondents. This can cause a systematic deviation of a 

survey estimate from the population value. This systematic deviation is called nonresponse bias, which 

can be measured as follows: 

 

where B is the nonresponse bias, is the mean estimate for the respondents, is the mean estimate 

for the nonrespondents, nnnnrr is the number of nonrespondents, and nn is the total number of sampled 

units. In other words, nonresponse bias may occur if the outcome variables correlate with response 

propensity (i.e., the likelihood of response). 

However, because information on the outcome variables was not available for nonrespondents, other 

information on the sampling frame was used to assess the nonresponse bias. A classification and 

regression tree (CART) was used to identify variables on the sampling frame that correlated with 

response status. Using available covariates, CART classified cases into classes that were related to their 

likelihood of being respondents. The algorithm, using the R package rpart (Therneau, Atkinson, and 

Ripley 2015), recursively partitioned cases into classes based on the association of the covariates and 

the response status.

For the IHE Survey, CART selected the following variables as being predictive of the response status 

based on the criterion of stopping the model-building or model-splitting process (thus stopping the 

variable selection) when the measure of fit does not improve:

• The percentage of recipients with at least one TEACH Grant in grant status

• The percentage of recipients who had independent status based on the first demographic 

profile on record

• The percentage of recipients who had a completion event in NSLDS after receiving a TEACH 

Grant at any institution

• The percentage of recipients who received a federal loan at the institution

• The percentage of recipients who were female based on the first demographic profile on record

• The percentage of recipients who were first-generation students based on the first demographic 

profile on record

• Region (Midwest, Northeast, Southwest, Southeast, or West)

• The percentage of recipients who ever received a Pell Grant in their academic career

• The percentage of recipients with at least one TEACH Grant in loan status
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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CART considered but did not select the following variables: 

• The number of grant recipients in the 2014–15 academic year

• The average number of TEACH Grants per recipient (calculated by grants/recipients) 

• School type (public, private, or for-profit)

For a small number of institutions, some data were missing. Because the missing rates were low (not 

more than 1 percent for any variable), these variables were imputed using a simple linear regression 

imputation. Missing data in each variable were imputed as follows:

• The variable was regressed on nonmissing variables school type, region, and number of TEACH 

Grant recipients in the 2014–15 academic year, using nonmissing cases only. 

• Cases with missing data for the variable were imputed with the predicted value from the 

regression model.

This imputation did not noticeably change the distribution of any variable.

For the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey, CART selected the following variables as being predictive of the 

response status based on the criterion of stopping the model-building or model-splitting process (thus 

stopping the variable selection) when the measure of fit does not improve:

• Difference in number of years between earliest award year of any converted TEACH Grant and 

obligation begin date of first grant received

• The recipient’s academic level when first receiving a TEACH Grant

• School type of the institution where the first TEACH Grant was received

• Region (Midwest, Northeast, Southwest, Southeast, or West)

• Whether the recipient ever received a Pell Grant (proxy for low income)

• Award year of the first TEACH Grant

• First-generation student status based on the first demographic profile on record

CART considered but did not select the following variables: 

• Status of TEACH Grant

• Grants received as an undergraduate or graduate (or both)

• Gender

• Dependent or independent status during the first demographic profile on record

• First-generation student status based on the first demographic profile on record

Only one case was missing on the variables gender, dependent or independent status during the first 

demographic profile on record, first-generation student status during the first demographic profile on 

record, and whether the recipient ever received a Pell Grant (proxy for low income). This case was 

imputed from the unweighted distribution of nonmissing values for the variable (e.g., the variable 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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gender was equal to “F” for approximately 70 percent of the cases, so the missing case had a 70 percent 

chance of being imputed with F). The variable difference between conversion date and obligation start 

date was missing for 252 cases. A “missing” category was created for cases with valid data, and the 

variable was treated as a categorical variable. 

For both surveys, after variable selection, a logistic regression was run with the response status as the 

dependent variable and the selected variables as predictors (main effects only). The fitted regression 

was then used to create a predicted response propensity score for each sampled case. The sample was 

then sorted by the response propensity score and divided into five quintile classes. For each quintile 

class, a nonresponse adjustment factor was calculated as the inverse of the observed response rate 

within the quintile class:

NNNNNNNN = 

nnrr + nnnnrr

nnrr

where NRAF is the nonresponse adjustment factor, nnrr is the number of respondents, and nnnnrr is the 

number of nonrespondents in the quintile class. 

For both surveys, the base weights were adjusted by the nonresponse adjustment factor for 

respondents and to 0 for nonrespondents.

Raking Adjustments

The nonresponse-adjusted weights were further adjusted by raking adjustments, such that the sum of 

the final weights matched population totals for the frame variables. The raking adjustment procedure 

can further correct for remaining bias after the nonresponse adjustments. This procedure iteratively 

adjusts the weights until a convergence criterion is reached, and the final weights can produce the 

marginal distributions of each frame variable adjusted in the procedure. Raking was performed using the 

STATA package ipfraking (Kolenikov 2014). All frame variables listed in the nonresponse adjustments 

section were raked to control totals. Continuous variables were recoded to four-category variables 

based on their quartiles because the raking method requires that all variables be categorical variables. 

The weights successfully converged to all the specified control totals.

Results of Nonresponse Bias Analysis and Assessment of Weighting Adjustments

As discussed earlier, variables on the sampling frame were used to assess the nonresponse bias. 

Variables on the sampling frame also were used to assess the effect of raking adjustments. The 

differences between the nonresponse-adjusted estimate and the population value were computed.

For the IHE Survey, most frame variables showed relatively low bias (see details in Exhibit C7). For the 

variables region and school type, the respondent proportion was within 1.5 percentage points of the 

sample proportion for all categories. For all continuous variables except the variable number of TEACH 

Grant recipients in the 2014–15 academic year, the respondent mean was within one unit of the sample 

mean. Nonresponse adjustments reduced the nonresponse bias for any noticeable small biases except 

for the variable school type, whose bias was removed completely in the raking adjustment. In addition, 

the raking adjustments reduced the remaining bias after nonresponse adjustments in the variable 

number of grant recipients in 2014–15 academic year by 15 percent. The biases in other variables after 

nonresponse adjustments virtually remained unchanged as they were all under 0.3 percentage points.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C7. Mean distribution of the frame variables for the selected sample, 

the respondent sample, and bias: IHE Survey 

Variable Sample Respondent NR bias

PostNR adj. 

bias

Postraking 

bias

School type

Private-nonprofit 52.3% 53.0% 0.71 1.44 0.0

Proprietary 1.3% 0.9% -0.40 -0.30 0.0

Public 46.4% 46.1% -0.31 -1.14 0.0

Region

Midwest 34.3% 34.8% 0.46 0.03 0.0

Northeast 18.2% 16.8% -1.41 0.07 0.0

Southeast 21.6% 21.2% -0.45 -0.13 0.0

Southwest 11.9% 12.2% 0.31 -0.18 0.0

West 14.0% 15.1% 1.09 0.21 0.0

Number of TEACH Grant recipients in the 2014–15 

academic year

63.0 68.2 5.2 3.8 3.2

Percentage of recipients with at least one TEACH 

Grant in loan status

60.8% 60.7% -0.1 0.2 -0.1

Percentage of recipients with at least one TEACH 

Grant in grant status

5.9% 6.2% 0.4 0.0 0.0

Female 80.5% 80.5% 0.0 -0.1 0.0

Percentage of recipients who had independent 

status based on the first demographic profile 

on record

32.3% 32.5% 0.2 -0.1 0.1

Percentage of recipients who ever received a Pell 

Grant in their academic career

60.3% 59.8% -0.5 0.1 0.2

Percentage of recipients who were first-generation 

students based on the first demographic 

profile on record

33.7% 33.4% -0.3 -0.1 0.0

Percentage of recipients who received a federal 

loan at the institution

90.9% 90.4% -0.5 -0.1 0.0

Percentage of recipients who had a completion 

event after receiving a grant at any institution

60.9% 61.7% 0.7 0.0 -0.3

Average number of grants per recipient (calculated 

by grants/recipients)

1.9% 1.9% 0.0 0.0 0.0

Note: “NR bias” refers to the difference between the base-weighted respondent mean and the base-weighted sample mean; “post-NR adj. bias” 

refers to the difference between the nonresponse-weighted respondent mean and the base-weighted sample mean; and “post-raking bias” 

refers to the difference between the raked-weighted respondent mean and the base-weighted sample mean.

For the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey (see Exhibit C8), the median bias (in absolute value terms) was 

1.3 percentage points, the mean was 2.0 percentage points, and the highest bias (for the “loan” 

category of current grant status) was 10.6 percentage points. After nonresponse adjustments, the 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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median bias was 0.4 percentage points, the mean was 0.5 percentage points, and the highest bias was 

1.9 percentage points. Nonresponse adjustments effectively reduced observed nonresponse biases in 

the frame variables.

The raking adjustments did not have a big impact the bias. It further reduced the biases in categorical 

variables school type and region. The results for continuous variables were mixed. However, since the 

observed biases after either nonresponse adjustments or raking adjustments were miniscule, no further 

adjustments were made. The raked weights were the final weights for analysis.

Exhibit C8. Distribution of the frame variables for the selected sample, the respondent sample, 

and bias: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey

Variable

Sample

(percentage)

Respondent

(percentage) NR bias

PostNR 

bias

Postraking 

bias

Number of TEACH Grants received

1 41.9 40.8 -1.1 0.5 0.7

2 31.2 32.4 1.2 0.7 0.8

3 17.7 19.0 1.3 -0.5 -0.8

4+ 9.2 7.8 -1.4 -0.7 -0.6

The recipient’s academic level when 

first receiving a TEACH Grant

1 8.8 5.9 -2.9 -0.4 -0.4

2 9.8 9.1 -0.7 -0.5 -1.0

3 9.7 10.6 1.0 0.4 0.5

4 13.9 15.2 1.3 0.1 0.7

5 3.1 2.7 -0.4 -0.6 -0.7

6 35.8 38.2 2.4 0.1 -0.2

7 17.5 16.4 -1.1 1.1 1.2

8 0.2 0.4 0.2 0.0 0.0

9 1.2 1.5 0.3 -0.1 -0.2

Award year of first TEACH Grant

2008–09 13.8 15.6 1.8 0.5 0.1

2009–10 27.0 27.5 0.5 1.6 1.6

2010–11 26.7 23.6 -3.1 -1.9 -1.9

2011–12 17.8 19.1 1.3 -0.1 -0.2

2012–13 10.2 10.0 -0.2 0.0 0.1

2013–14 4.4 4.2 -0.2 -0.1 0.3

Status of TEACH Grant

Grant 33.6 41.5 7.8 -0.4 0.7

Loan 58.9 48.4 -10.5 0.0 0.0

Completed in full 7.5 10.1 2.6 0.4 -0.7

School type of the institution where 

the first TEACH Grant was received 

Private-nonprofit 41.8 42.5 0.8 1.5 0.0

Proprietary 9.3 10.9 1.6 -0.1 0.0

Public 48.9 46.5 -2.4 -1.4 0.0

TEACH Grants received as an 

undergraduate or graduate (or 

both)

Correspondence only 1.2 1.5 0.3 -0.1 -0.2

Graduate 53.5 55.0 1.5 1.2 1.0

Undergraduate and graduate 3.3 2.7 -0.6 -0.7 -0.8

Undergraduate 42.0 40.8 -1.2 -0.4 0.0
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C8. Distribution of the frame variables for the selected sample, the respondent sample, 

and bias: TEACH Grant Recipient Survey (Continued)

Variable

Sample

(percentage)

Respondent

(percentage) NR bias

PostNR 

bias

Postraking 

bias

Gender

Female 78.5 80.6 2.1 0.7 -0.8

Male 16.5 15.1 -1.3 -0.1 1.4

Missing 5.1 4.3 -0.8 -0.7 -0.7

Dependent or independent status 

during the first demographic profile 

on record

Dependent 65.5 62.2 -3.3 -0.5 -2.7

Independent 34.5 37.8 3.3 0.5 2.7

First-generation student status 

based on the first demographic 

profile on record

No 69.1 71.1 2.0 0.9 -3.9

Yes 30.9 28.9 -2.0 -0.9 3.9

Whether the recipient ever received 

a Pell Grant (proxy for low income)

No 40.8 43.5 2.7 0.3 -0.7

Yes 59.2 56.5 -2.7 -0.3 0.7

Region

Midwest 28.8 28.4 -0.5 0.2 0.0

Northeast 14.9 13.8 -1.1 -0.2 0.0

Southeast 16.9 16.9 -0.1 1.6 0.0

Southwest 22.1 21.2 -0.9 -1.5 0.4

West 17.2 19.8 2.6 -0.1 -0.4

Difference in number of years 

between earliest award year of any 

converted TEACH Grant and 

obligation begin date of first grant 

received

0 2.8 1.9 -0.9 -0.5 -0.5

1 16.4 11.5 -4.9 -0.3 -0.6

2 15.0 11.4 -3.6 -0.1 -0.2

3 10.0 7.6 -2.4 0.4 0.5

4 7.1 8.8 1.6 0.1 0.3

5 3.3 3.4 0.1 0.1 0.1

6+ 2.1 1.5 -0.6 0.2 0.3

Missing 43.2 53.8 10.6 0.1 0.0

Note: “NR bias” refers to the difference between the base-weighted respondent mean and the base-weighted sample mean; “post-NR adj. bias” 

refers to the difference between the nonresponse-weighted respondent mean and the base-weighted sample mean; and “post-raking bias” 

refers to the difference between the raked-weighted respondent mean and the base-weighted sample mean. 

Data File Creation 

After the data collection period ended, frequencies and cross tabulations of the survey data were 

examined, including verification that (1) the data file contained only values that were specified in the 

instrument, (2) the total number of cases in the frequency distributions was correct, (3) skip patterns 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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were followed correctly, and (4) the results matched plausible expectations. The following subsections 

detail the specific processing steps taken with each survey’s data.

IHE Survey 

To create the final IHE Survey analytic data file, several files were merged together. The data for the 

21 completed paper surveys were merged with the 324 completed online surveys data file to create the full 

survey data file (n = 345). Next, several variables were merged to complete the data file. The data for the 

58 cases that provided follow-up data for variables in questions A10–A15 were merged with the original 

online data file to fill in those variables (see earlier explanation for the programming error that necessitated 

this merge). Finally, frame characteristics such as school type, conversion rate, and the number of recipients 

were merged into the survey data file, along with weights for nonresponse adjustment. 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey 

Several files were merged together to create the final recipient survey analytic data file. The data for the 

26 completed paper surveys were merged with the 296 cases from the online data file to create the full 

survey data file (n = 322). Next, the survey data were merged with the frame characteristics and weights. 

Analysis Methods

Key Variables and Variable Derivation 

Extant Data

The recipient-level data of approximately 78,000 records, which resulted from the merge of the PHEAA 

and NSLDS data described in the Data Sources section, were aggregated by institution to calculate 

institutional overall conversion rates for the 2008–2014 cohort. Conversion rates were calculated for 

each institution by dividing the total number of TEACH Grant recipients for the 2008–2014 cohort by the 

number of recipients whose grants had been converted to loans. This same formula was used to 

calculate conversion rates of various demographic groups of recipients. The unit of analysis for these 

conversion rate analyses was the unique combination of recipient and institution; therefore, a small 

number of recipients (approximately 600) who obtained TEACH Grants at multiple institutions are 

reflected in this data set more than once.

IHE Survey 

The IHE Survey contained 15 “grid” questions that instructed the respondents to “check all that apply” 

to report the incidence of certain activities. For example, one series of grid questions asked about the 

methods of communicating about the grant to students, with rows for student subgroups that could be 

specified and columns for the various methods (e.g., email, events, flyers), with the respondent looped 

through the grid for each office or department that was involved in those activities at the institution 

(e.g., the college of education or financial aid office). 

The detailed responses to these grid questions were collapsed into “summary” and “super-summary” 

variables, and statistics were generated for these variables rather than the detailed responses. First, a 

summary variable was created indicating whether any row (e.g., student subgroup) was selected in each 

column (e.g., communication method) for each iteration of the grid (e.g., institutional office or 

department). Then super-summary variables were created that indicated whether the column (e.g., 

communication method) was selected for any of the grids in the series (e.g., institutional office or 

department). Then the super-summary variables were combined for multiple grid questions in the 

following groupings: communication methods (questions A11–A15), integrated counseling (questions 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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A19, A21, A23, A25, and A27), and stand-alone counseling (questions A20, A22, A24, A26, and A28). All 

summary variables indicate 1 if any of the contributing items was answered 1 = yes (applies) and 0 if 

none of the items was answered 1 = yes (i.e., all contributing items have a value of 0 or missing). 

TEACH Grant Recipient Survey 

A respondent race and ethnicity variable was constructed based on responses to separate race and 

Hispanic ethnicity items in the survey. Any respondents who reported in the survey that they were 

Hispanic or Latino were coded as Hispanic and not included in any of the race categories. The race and 

ethnicity categories included Hispanic or Latino, White, Black or African-American, American Indian or 

Alaska Native, Asian, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, and a multirace category for those who 

reported more than one race (excluding Hispanic or Latino). 

For the currentstatus variable, which indicates whether (1) a grant was converted to a loan, (2) a grant was 

still active as a grant, or (3) all the requirements for their grant had been completed, items 2 and 3 were 

combined for the analytic purposes of comparing Recipientsin loan status and recipientsin grant status. 

For question A16, which asked about the current likelihood of completing the grant requirements, 

responses for “unlikely” and “very unlikely” were collapsed. For a very small number of Recipients in 

grant status (n = 2) who reported in question A16 that their grants had already been converted to loans, 

this response to A16 and any subsequent response to A17 was excluded for analysis purposes because 

the response to A16 was inconsistent with the grant status in the PHEAA data set used for sampling. 

For question A17, several sets of response categories were collapsed such that if any of the items in that 

set were affirmed, then the set was affirmed. The following list shows which categories were grouped 

under each of the labels used in Exhibits A2.2c and A2.2f:

• Teaching in a position that does not qualify for TEACH Grant service

– Currently teaching, but not in a position that qualifies for TEACH Grant service

– I started teaching in a qualifying TEACH position, but changed to a nonqualifying TEACH 

position

• Not teaching or did not complete certification/degree

– Did not continue in a teacher preparation program

– Did not graduate from college or graduate school

– Graduated from a teacher preparation program, but did not go into teaching

– After starting teaching, I left the profession altogether

• Another factor

– Was never certain about intent to teach

– Did not meet state requirements for a Highly Qualified Teacher (HQT)

– I changed to a nonteaching, administrative position at a school (e.g., promotion to principal) 

prior to fulfilling my service
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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For question A17B_1, which asked about the reasons why the recipient did not certify annually, 

response categories “I did not know about annual certification” and “I did not know the process for 

annual certification” were collapsed.

Responses to question A17G_1, which asked about the reasons why the recipient was teaching in a 

position not eligible for grant service, were collapsed, such that the responses “I decided I did not want 

to teach in a high-need field” and “I decided I did not want to teach in a high-need school” were 

analyzed together, as were the responses “I could not find a job in a high-need field” and “I could not 

find a job in a high-need school”; this collapsing of categories also enabled the backcoding of four otherspecify responses to this question that were otherwise not specific enough to backcode.

Variance Estimation

Proportions for the populations and subpopulations were estimated with design weights adjusted by 

nonresponse using the Stata statistical software. The variance estimation, using the Taylor expansion 

method, also took stratification into account. The sampling variance is a measure of reliability of the 

estimate, which largely depends on the sample size. If the survey was conducted with the same sample 

size under the same conditions repeatedly, the interval of the estimate minus 1.96 times the standard 

error (the square root of the variance) and the estimate plus 1.96 times the standard error would 

include the population value in approximately 95 percent of the samples. Therefore, the interval 

calculated in this manner is called the 95 percent confidence interval.

Statistical Tests

To test whether the difference is statistically significant, comparisons of estimates between subgroups 

were tested at the significance level of 0.05, which is a measure of the probability (5 percent) that the 

observed difference between subgroups would have arisen by chance. If the probability is less than 

5 percent, the difference is said to be statistically significant because it is unlikely to occur by chance.

The differences in proportions between subgroups were tested by calculating a z-statistic based on the 

following formula:

 

where pp̂1 and pp̂2 are the estimated proportions in the subgroups in comparison and vvvvvv(pp̂1) and 

vvvvvv(pp̂2) are the variance of the estimated proportions. The z-score was compared to a Z table that 

contains the percentage of area under the normal curve between the zero and the z-score, and the 

Z table was used to determine whether the calculated z-score was likely to have happened by chance. 

The statistical significance was tested using a two-tailed test, which means the possibility of the 

relationship of the two proportions was tested in both directions.

Because the TEACH Grant Recipient Survey was a sample survey, sampling variance was computed, and 

the differences in proportions between subgroups were tested for statistical significance. In contrast, 

because the IHE Survey was a universe survey, differences in proportions between subpopulations were 

presented without statistical tests.
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Qualitative Interview Coding and Analysis

The analytic process for the interview data entailed three key activities: preparing interview transcripts, 

analyzing the qualitative data collected on-site, and reporting the findings. These activities are described 

in the following subsections in more detail.

Transcripts of All Case Study Interviews

The site visit team referred to the notes from the interviews conducted on-site as well as the transcribed 

interview audio files28 to prepare an accurate documentation of each interview. 

Qualitative Analysis

A set of qualitative analytic procedures were designed to limit bias and ensure reliable findings. These 

methods included standards of evidence, triangulation of data, and procedures for measuring interrater 

agreement.

A set of preliminary codes were developed that aligned with the study questions and the interview 

protocols. NVivo qualitative data analysis software was used to code each transcript using the 

preliminary set of codes. The coded data were used to identify emergent themes that addressed the 

related research questions. The case study lead met regularly with the case study analytic team to 

review and confirm the consistent application of the codebook, discuss possible additions or 

refinements to the codebook based on emergent themes, and clarify decision rules regarding the 

application of specific codes. During these discussions, the team also identified additional codes that 

were needed to categorize the data to better address the study questions.

Exhibit C9 presents the preliminary list of codes and coding category definitions. 

 

28 AIR sent interview audio files to Rev.com for transcription.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Exhibit C9. Preliminary codes and code definitions

Primary research 

question addressed Code Code definition and application rules

DESCRIPTIVE CODES

RQ1: 

How are TEACH 

Grants 

administered in 

institutions?

I. Respondent role, 

participation with TEACH Grant

Respondent discusses role in administering the 

TEACH Grant.

II. TEACH Grant and school 

goals

Respondent discusses the school’s or college of 

education’s goals concerning the TEACH Grant.

III. School criteria for TEACH 

Grant

Respondent discusses site-specific criteria used to 

determine eligibility for the TEACH Grant.

IV. Applicant outreach Respondent describes processes used to introduce 

or explain the TEACH Grant to students.

V. School recruitment and 

TEACH Grant

Respondent discusses the role of the TEACH Grant 

in recruitment for the school or college of 

education.

VI. School admissions and

TEACH Grant

Respondent discusses the role of the TEACH Grant 

in the school or college of education admissions 

process.

VII. Financial aid and TEACH 

Grant

Respondent discusses the role of the financial aid

office in administering the TEACH Grant, as well as 

mentioning various financial aid packages 

accessed by students.

VIII. Student counseling and 

TEACH Grant

Respondent discusses use of the TEACH Grant in 

the student counseling process. 

IX. Field study, student teaching 

placement, and TEACH Grant

Respondent describes the process of field study or 

student teaching placement for TEACH Grant 

recipients or as it otherwise relates to the TEACH 

Grant.

X. Job placement and TEACH 

Grant

Respondent describes the job placement process 

for TEACH Grant recipients or as it otherwise 

relates to the TEACH Grant. 

RQ2:

Why do some 

TEACH Grant 

recipients not meet 

the program service 

requirements?

XI. Service requirements Respondent describes the service requirements of 

the TEACH Grant, including reasons for completion 

of or not completing the service requirements.

XII. Student use of TEACH Grant Respondent describes students’ perception of, 

knowledge and understanding of, or motivation 

and reasons for accessing the TEACH Grant. 
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Exhibit C9. Preliminary codes and code definitions (Continued)

Primary research 

question addressed Code Code definition and application rules

CROSS-CUTTING CODES: Can be double-coded with any topic

RQ1–3:

How are TEACH 

Grants 

administered in 

institutions?

Why do some 

TEACH Grant 

recipients not meet 

the program service 

requirements?

What factors are 

associated with 

TEACH Grant 

recipients meeting 

and not meeting 

the grant 

requirements?

Concerns Respondent expresses concerns or reservations 

about administering the TEACH Grant.

Challenges Respondent describes challenges experienced 

throughout the administration of the TEACH 

Grant. 

Successes Respondent describes successes or positives 

experienced throughout the administration of the 

TEACH Grant. 

Supports Respondent describes supports, including 

trainings, received or offered throughout the 

TEACH Grant administration process.

Recommendations Respondent expresses advice or 

recommendations for improvement. 

Changes across time Respondent describes changes to the TEACH Grant 

administration process across time. 

Communication Respondent describes communication between 

different entities throughout the TEACH Grant 

administration process.

Coordination Respondent describes coordinated interactions 

between different entities throughout the TEACH 

Grant administration process.

Data use Respondent describes data use processes, 

including tracking and monitoring of students and 

TEACH Grant recipients.

Local labor market factors Respondent discusses local or regional labor 

market factors.

Good quote Used to mark text that contains an illustrative 

quote from a respondent.

Preliminary Summary of Key Findings

After all the data were coded, queries were run from these coded data using NVivo to organize and 

summarize the data by study question and conducted within-case and cross-case analyses to identify the 

prevalence of specific practices as well as patterns and relationships among variables across cases.

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Appendix D. Data Collection Instruments

Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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Survey of Institutions of Higher Education

A1. Please provide the name, title, and contact information for the staff member coordinating the 

survey response: 

a. Name: _________________________________

b. Title: __________________________________

c. Phone Number: __________________________

d. Email Address: __________________________

A2. What are your institutional goals for the use of TEACH Grants?

Please select all that apply.

 Encourage education students to pursue teaching in a high-need subject at a low-income 

school

 To make education more affordable for teacher-candidates potentially interested in 

teaching in a high-need subject at a low-income school.

 Other (please specify) __________________________________________________ 

A3. Please elaborate on your institutional goals, if necessary:

______________________________________________________________________________________

A4. Does your institution award TEACH Grants to undergraduates? 

Please select only one.

Yes  Go to Question A5

No  Go to Question A6

A5. Which option below best characterizes the proportion of TEACH Grants undergraduate

recipients at your institution that are exclusively distance education students? 

Please select only one.

 All recipients

 A majority of recipients 

 Some, but less than half of recipients

 No recipients

A6. Does your institution award TEACH Grants to graduate students? 

Please select only one.

Yes  Go to Question A7

No  Go to Question A8
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A7. Which option below best characterizes the proportion of TEACH Grants graduate recipients at 

your institution that are exclusively distance education students? 

Please select only one.

 All recipients

 A majority of recipients

 Some, but less than half of recipients

 No recipients

A8. What office or department has the lead oversight role for TEACH Grants on your campus?

Please select only one.

 Financial Aid Office

 School/Department of Education

 Other Field-specific School or Department (please specify)_____________________ 

 Career Services

A8a. What does that lead oversight role entail (e.g., setting goals, student outreach, tracking of 

awards, tracking of fulfillment grant requirements/conversion of grants to loans, etc.)? 

______________________________________________________________________________________

A9. Please indicate how your institution limits which teacher preparation students can receive 

TEACH Grants: 

Please select all that apply.

 Students must complete a minimum number of courses required for a teaching credential 

(please specify the number)

 Students must complete a minimum number of courses in a specific field/subject (please 

specify the number)

 Students must declare a major and/or minor in high-need fields

 Students must declare a major and/or minor in teaching

 Students must have been admitted into the teacher preparation program

 Freshman are excluded

 Sophomores are excluded

 Juniors are excluded

 First-year graduate students are excluded

 Students must achieve a GPA higher than the minimum set by TEACH

 Other (please specify) __________________________________________________ 

 Not Applicable
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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A9a. In the previous question about how your institution limits which teacher preparation students 

can receive TEACH Grants, you selected “Students must complete a minimum number of 

courses required for a teacher credential.” What is the minimum number of courses required?

Please enter the number of courses in the box. If you do not know, please select “Don’t know”

 Number of courses ____________________________________________________ 

 Don’t know

A9b. In the previous question about how your institution limits which teacher preparation students 

can receive TEACH Grants, you selected “Students must complete a minimum number of 

courses in a specific field/subject.” What is the minimum number of courses required?

Please enter the number of courses in the box.

If you do not know, please select “Don’t know”

 Number of courses ____________________________________________________ 

 Don’t know

A10. Which departments or offices on your campus inform students about the TEACH Grant? 

Please select all that apply.

 Financial Aid Office

 School/Department of Education

 Other Field-Specific School or Department (e.g., mathematics)

 Career Services

 Other(s) (please specify) ________________________________________________ (5)

A11. How does the Financial Aid Office inform students about the TEACH Grant? Please indicate the 

mode of communication used to make the different subsets of students aware of the TEACH 

Grant program.

Please select all that apply

• Student subsets might include students taking specific courses, students with 

specific demographic backgrounds, and students at a specific academic level (e.g., 

freshman, sophomore, junior, senior)

• Person-to-person contact refers to an in-person interaction such as a meeting with a 

financial aid counselor.

Targeted Students Email Events Flyers

Person-toperson contact

Website 

(please 

specify URL)

Other 

(please 

specify)

All Students      

Student Subset 1:      

Student Subset 2:      

Student Subset 3:      

Student Subset 4:      
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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A12. How does the School/Department of Education inform students about the TEACH Grant? 

Please indicate the mode of communication used to make the different subsets of students 

aware of the TEACH Grant program.

Targeted Students Email Events Flyers 

Person-toperson contact 

Website 

(please 

specify URL)

Other 

(please 

specify) 

All Students      

Student Subset 1:      

Student Subset 2:      

Student Subset 3:      

Student Subset 4:      

A13. How does the Other Field-Specific School or Department inform students about the TEACH 

Grant? Please indicate the mode of communication used to make the different subsets of 

students aware of the TEACH Grant program.

Targeted Students Email Events Flyers 

Person-toperson contact 

Website 

(please 

specify URL)

Other 

(please 

specify) 

All Students      

Student Subset 1:      

Student Subset 2:      

Student Subset 3:      

Student Subset 4:      

A14. How does Career Services inform students about the TEACH Grant? Please indicate the mode 

of communication used to make the different subsets of students aware of the TEACH Grant 

program.

Targeted Students Email Events Flyers 

Person-toperson contact 

Website 

(please 

specify URL)

Other 

(please 

specify) 

All Students      

Student Subset 1:      

Student Subset 2:      

Student Subset 3:      

Student Subset 4:      
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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A15. How do Others inform students about the TEACH Grant? Please indicate the mode of 

communication used to make the different subsets of students aware of the TEACH Grant 

program.

Targeted Students Email Events Flyers 

Person-toperson contact 

Website 

(please 

specify URL)

Other 

(please 

specify) 

All Students      

Student Subset 1:      

Student Subset 2:      

Student Subset 3:      

Student Subset 4:      

A16. Please email any existing example emails, flyers, etc. as noted in previous questions.

Please select only one.

 Yes, I will email the examples. (You will be prompted at the end of the survey to email these 

documents).

 No, I am unable to provide examples at this time.

A17. Does your institution provide information about the availability of TEACH Grants to 

prospective teacher education students considering applying to your institution?

Please select only one.

 Yes

 No

 Not Sure

A18. Which departments or offices on your campus offer counseling and advising specific to the 

TEACH Grant program? 

Please select all that apply.

 Financial Aid Office 

 School/Department of Education 

 Other Field-Specific School or Department (e.g., Mathematics) 

 Career Services

 Other (please specify)_______________________________________________ 

 Other (please specify)_______________________________________________ 

 Other (please specify)_______________________________________________ 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

110 

A19. What type of integrated counseling or advising does the Financial Aid Office provide?

• Integrated refers to a counseling or advising session in which other topics are discussed, such 

as loan counseling.

• In-Person refers to in-person interactions such as meetings with a financial aid counselor.

Please select all that apply.

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Integrated counseling or advising targeted to ...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     

A20. What type of stand-alone counseling or advising does the Financial Aid Office provide?

• Stand-alone refers to a counseling or advising session solely dedicated to discussion of the 

TEACH Grant.

Please select all that apply.

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Stand-alone counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

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A21. What type of integrated counseling or advising does the School/Department of Education

provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Integrated counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     

A22. What type of stand-alone counseling or advising does the School/Department of Education

provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Stand-alone Counseling or Advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

112 

A23. What type of integrated counseling or advising does the Other Field-Specific School or 

Department provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Integrated counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     

A24. What type of stand-alone counseling or advising does the Other Field-Specific School or 

Department provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Stand-alone counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

113 

A25. What type of integrated counseling or advising does Career Services provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Integrated counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     

A26. What type of stand-alone counseling or advising does Career Services provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Stand-alone counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

114 

A27. What type of integrated counseling or advising do [OTHERS] provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Integrated counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     

A28. What type of stand-alone counseling or advising do [OTHERS] provide?

Optional 

online 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

online 

counseling/

advising

Optional inperson 

counseling/

advising

Mandatory 

in-person 

counseling/

advising

Not 

applicable

Stand-alone counseling or advising targeted to...

All students regardless of academic level     

Freshmen     

Sophomores     

Juniors     

Seniors     

First-year graduate students     

Second-year graduate students     

Others (please specify):     

A29. Please email any existing guidance documents or online resources used in counseling and 

advising.

Please select only one.

 Yes, I will email the documents. (You will be prompted at the end of the survey to email 

these documents.)

 No, I am unable to provide examples at this time. 
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

115 

A30. Do you have an institution-specific TEACH Grant application?

Please select only one.

 Yes

 No  Go To Question A32

A31. Please attach a copy or provide the URL for your TEACH Grant application.

 Yes, I will email a copy of the TEACH Grant application documents (such as word, gif, pdf, 

etc. files) (You will be prompted at the end of the survey to email these documents.)

 Yes, I have provided the URL to access the TEACH Grant application will mail the documents 

(please enter URL): ___________________________________________________________

 No, I am unable to provide examples at this time.

A32. Please indicate how subsections of your institution provide placement services for qualifying 

TEACH Grant service positions.

Please select all that apply.

Placement Service

Financial 

Aid Office

School/ 

Department 

of Education

Other FieldSpecific School 

or Department

Career 

Services

Other 

(please 

specify)

Providing an updated list of available 

positions to students

    

Guidance on how to identify positions 

that qualify for service

    

Establishing relationships with 

schools that have eligible positions

    

Other (please specify)______________     

A33. What challenges does your institution see in administering TEACH Grants?

A34. What promising strategies has your institution found useful in administering TEACH Grants to 

improve overall awareness of the program, knowledge of program requirements, placement and 

retention in qualifying schools and positions, and any other activities to support grant recipients?

A35. How influential are TEACH Grants on students’ decisions to pursue teaching as a career?

Please select only one.

 Very influential

 Somewhat influential

 Not influential

 Don’t know  Go To Question A37
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

116 

A36. Please note any data or experience that informs your opinion of how TEACH Grants influence 

students’ decisions to pursue teaching as a career. 

A37. How influential are TEACH Grant eligibility requirements on students’ decisions to pursue 

teacher certification in TEACH Grant-eligible fields and schools?

Please select only one.

 Very influential

 Somewhat influential

 Not influential

 Don’t know  Go To Question A39

A38. Please note any data or experience that informs your opinion of how TEACH Grant eligibility 

requirements influence students’ decisions to pursue teacher certification in TEACH Granteligible fields and schools.

______________________________________________________________________________________

A39. Do any of the practices or policies described in this survey represent a significant change in 

TEACH Grant administration since your institution first started administering these grants?

Please select only one.

 Yes

 No  Go to END /Thank you for completing this survey.

A40. Please indicate when changes in TEACH Grant administration were made and provide the 

reason why those changes were made. 

______________________________________________________________________________________

A41. You mentioned you would email us example emails and flyers to inform students of the 

TEACH Grant, existing guidance documents or online resources used in counseling and 

advising, and/or your TEACH Grant application. Please click here to email us those examples: 

TEACHGrantSurvey@air.org. 

Please confirm you are sending us these documents. 

 Yes, I am emailing documents.

 No, I am not emailing documents. 

END. Thank you for completing this survey.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

117 

Survey of TEACH Grant Recipients

A1. Please enter and the name of the institution where you received your first TEACH Grant(s): 

Institution:______________________________________________________________ 

A2. When you received your first TEACH Grant, what was your program of study, major and/or 

minor?

Please select all that apply.

 Education

 Mathematics 

 Science

 Foreign Language

 Bilingual Education

 English Language Acquisition

 Special Education

 Reading Specialist

 Other (please specify) __________________________________________________ 

A3. Were you formally accepted and admitted into a teacher preparation program (e.g., accepted 

into the school of education at an institution)?

Please select only one.

 Yes

 No Go to Question A5

 Not applicable (e.g., the institution did not provide this option, or I did not know of an 

option to do so)  Go to Question A5

A4. Were you accepted and admitted into a teacher preparation program prior to receiving your 

first TEACH Grant or after receiving your first TEACH Grant?

Please select only one.

 Prior to receiving my first TEACH Grant

 After receiving my first TEACH Grant
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

118 

A5. What is your enrollment status?

Please select only one.

 Still enrolled in the institution at which you received your first TEACH Grant.

 Enrolled at an institution other than the institution in which you received your first TEACH 

Grant.

 Completed/graduated at the institution at which you received your first TEACH Grant.  Go 

to Question A7

 Completed/graduated at an institution other than the institution in which you received your 

first TEACH Grant.  Go to Question A7

 Not enrolled and withdrew from school without completing/graduating, and do not have 

plans to re-enroll in the next year  Go to Question A8

 Not enrolled and withdrew from school without completing/graduating, but have plans to 

re-enroll in the next year  Go to Question A8

A6. What is your current program of study, major, and/or minor?

Please select all that apply.

 Education

 Mathematics

 Science

 Foreign Language

 Bilingual Education

 English Language Acquisition

 Special Education

 Reading Specialist

 Other _______________________________________________________________

GO TO A8.

A7. What was the program of study, major, and/or minor you completed?

Please select all that apply.

 Education

 Mathematics

 Science

 Foreign Language

 Bilingual Education

 English Language Acquisition

 Special Education

 Reading Specialist

 Other _______________________________________________________________
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

119 

A8. Upon leaving your teacher preparation program, how well informed were you about 

determining whether or not a specific teaching position was or was not in a qualifying highneed field at a low-income school, as defined by TEACH requirements? 

Please select only one.

 Well informed

 Moderately informed

 Somewhat informed

 Not informed

A9. Upon leaving your teacher preparation program, how well informed were you about the 

requirement to annually certify your intent to teach in a high-need field at a low-income 

school? 

Please select only one.

 Well informed

 Moderately informed

 Somewhat informed

 Not informed

A10. When you were at the institution at which you received your TEACH Grant(s), how much of 

your course instruction was online?

Please select only one.

 All course instruction

 Majority of course instruction

 Less than half of course instruction

 No course instruction

A11. How did you first learn about TEACH Grants?

Please select all that apply.

 Financial Aid Office Representative

 Instructor/Professor

 Counselor

 Another student

 College/University website

 College/University flyer

 Other (please specify) __________________________________________________ 

A12. How influential was the TEACH Grant as an incentive to pursue teaching as a career? 

Please select only one.

 Very influential

 Somewhat influential

 Not very influential

 Not at all influential
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

120 

A13. In the process of obtaining your first TEACH Grant, how well informed were you about the 

four-year service requirement to teach in a qualifying high-need field at a low-income school? 

Please select only one.

 Well informed 

 Moderately informed

 Somewhat informed

 Not informed

A14. How influential was the TEACH Grant as an incentive to pursue teaching in a high-need field at 

a low-income school? 

Please select only one.

 Very influential

 Somewhat influential

 Not very influential

 Not at all influential

A15. When you received your first TEACH Grant, how did you feel about your likelihood of fulfilling 

the TEACH Grant four-year service requirement to teach in a qualifying high-need field at a 

low-income school? 

Please select only one.

 Very likely

 Likely

 Unlikely

 Very unlikely

 Did not know 

A16. Please think about your first TEACH Grant. As of today, how do you feel about the likelihood 

that you will fulfill the TEACH Grant four-year service requirement to teach in a qualifying 

high-need field at a low-income school? 

Please select only one.

 Service requirements already met  Go To Question A18

 Very likely  Go To Question A18

 Likely  Go To Question A18

 Unlikely  Go To Question A17

 Very unlikely  Go To Question A17

 Do not know  Go To Question A17

 Not applicable: My grant(s) were already converted to loan(s)  Go To Question A17
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

121 

A17. Did any of the following factors influence your likelihood of completing the service 

requirements?

Please select all that apply. In each applicable response, please select why.

No Yes Why

a. Did not understand the 

service requirements of 

the grant

 

b. Failed to certify annually 



 b_1. Why? 

o I forgot about annual certification

o I did not know about annual certification

o I did not know the process for annual certification

o I elected not to certify

o Other (please specify)

c. Was never certain about 

an intention to teach

 

d. Did not continue in a 

teacher preparation 

program





 d_1. Why? 

o I fell below the academic requirements

o I had a change in interests

o Other (please specify) ______________________

e. Did not graduate from 

college or graduate 

school





 e_1. Why?

o I fell below the academic requirements

o I had a change in interests

o Financial reasons (e.g., could no longer afford to 

attend)

o Other (please specify) ______________________

f. Graduated from a 

teacher preparation 

program, but did not go 

into teaching





 f_1. Why? 

o I was unable to obtain a job in teaching

o I had a change in interests

o Personal reasons, unrelated to the teaching 

profession

o I pursued a higher-paying profession

o Other (please specify)

g. Currently teaching, but 

not in a position that 

qualifies for TEACH Grant 

service





 g_1. Why?

o I decided I did not want to teach in a high-need field.

o I decided I did not want to teach at a low-income 

school.

o I applied to one or more qualifying positions, but was 

not offered the position.

o I could not find a job in a high-need field.

o I could not find a job at a low-income school.

o I found a higher paying teaching position at a nonqualifying school

o Other (please specify) __________________
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

122 

No Yes Why

h. Did not meet state 

requirements for a Highly 

Qualified Teacher (HQT)

 

i. After starting teaching, I 

left the profession 

altogether.





 i_1. Why?

o Teaching was more difficult than I expected

o Teaching was not challenging enough

o Teaching compensation was not enough.

o I received a job offer in a different field of work.

o Personal reasons unrelated to the teaching 

profession.

o Other (please specify)

j. I started teaching in a 

qualifying TEACH 

position, but changed to 

a non-qualifying TEACH 

position.





 j_1. Was the new position:

o In the same high-need field, but at a non-qualifying 

school?

o At a low-income school, but in a non-qualifying field?

j_2. Why?

o Teaching in a qualifying position was too difficult.

o Teaching in a qualifying position was no longer 

interesting.

o Teaching in a qualifying position did not pay enough.

o Other (please specify)

k. I changed to a nonteaching, administrative 

position at a school (e.g., 

promotion to principal) 

prior to fulfilling my 

service





 k_1. Was the non-teaching position:

o At a low-income school

o Not at a low-income school

A18. Did you obtain a TEACH Grant earlier in your teacher preparation program (e.g., freshman 

year or first year of graduate school), but not in subsequent years leading up to graduating 

with a teaching credential (for example, obtaining a grant in your sophomore year, but not 

your senior year)? 

Please select only one.

 Yes

 No  Go To Question A20

 Don’t know  Go To Question A20
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

123 

A19. Why did you obtain a TEACH Grant earlier in your teacher preparation program, but not in 

subsequent years?

Please select only one.

 I did not meet counseling requirements of the TEACH Grant (i.e. did not pass the counseling 

quiz or complete required counseling)

 I did not meet the academic requirements

 I transferred to a teacher preparation program for a different field of teaching

 I stayed in a qualifying field but transferred to an institution that doesn’t offer TEACH Grants

 I decided to pursue a field and career other than teaching

 I changed my mind about my intention to teach in a high-need field at a low-income school

 Other (please specify) __________________________________________________ 

A20. Do you consider yourself to be Hispanic/Latino?

Please select only one.

 Yes

 No

A21. In addition, select one or more of the following racial categories to describe yourself:

Please select one or more.

 American Indian or Alaska Native

 Asian

 Black or African American

 Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander

 White

END. Thank you for completing this survey.
Study of the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program

124 

Dean of Education Protocol

1. As you know, one grant offered by the US Department of Education that is specifically designed to 

support students who are planning to teach is the TEACH Grant. How much do you know about the 

TEACH Grant program? If they do not say, ask when their university began to administer the TEACH 

Grant?

a. To what extent were you and your faculty involved in deciding whether your institution 

would participate in the TEACH Grant program?

b. Did you have any concerns about participating in the grant program? 

2. How does the TEACH Grant fit within the goals and objectives of the school or college of education 

and its programs to prepare teachers? How does your university/school of education use the TEACH 

Grant to meet those goals (e.g., for recruiting students who plan to teach STEM fields)? 

Probes:

a. For example, does the school or college of education use the grant program to attract 

students who are interested in high-need fields and/or encourage students to go into highneed fields (e.g., STEM, special education, bilingual education) or consider teaching at highneed schools? Please explain.

b. Can you discuss how the TEACH Grant aligns with any other activities that are used to 

promote teaching in high-need fields or in high-need schools?

c. What does the university/school do to promote the availability of the TEACH Grant?

3. How does the school or college of education staff and faculty coordinate with other entities within 

your institution in administering the TEACH Grant? 

Probes: 

a. Do you meet regularly with teacher education program staff, the financial aid office, or 

others to discuss criteria for eligibility, implementation of the TEACH Grant or other similar 

grant opportunities for students? Is this coordination effective?

b. Who determines when students become eligible for the TEACH Grant?

c. Who explains grant eligibility and requirements to students and to faculty?

d. Who do students contact at [name of IHE] if they have any questions once they have become 

grant recipients? 

4. In your opinion, what motivates students to apply for the TEACH Grant? 

a. Does the students’ interest come from a need for financial aid, an interest in teaching or, 

elsewhere?

5. Based on the survey results we reviewed, your institution uses criteria [cite the survey results to 

inform specific criteria such as academic level, GPA higher than the federal minimum] to determine 

eligibility to receive TEACH Grants at your institution. 

Please explain why these criteria are in place. 

a. Sometimes, students receive TEACH Grants in their first year, second year or third year. Who 

determines when students at your become eligible for the TEACH Grant? 
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b. How are the grant eligibility requirements explained to students, faculty, and staff such as 

advisors, counselors, field placement staff, etc.?

c. Has the timing of the eligibility changed from when you first started to administer the grant 

to now?

6. As you might know, the national average grant-to-loan conversion rate is high which is what 

prompted the Department to learn more about the grant program. What do you see happening in 

your institution with grant-to-loan conversion rates? Given the unique circumstances at your 

institution, what are your goals and expectations for these grants?

Probes: 

a. What challenges does the school or college of education experience when administering the 

grant? 

b. Are there local labor market or other economic factors that you think come into play that 

might impact a recipient’s ability to complete the grant requirements? For example, what 

are the employment opportunities available for teaching candidates in local districts? And 

how might this Grant align or not align with what you see happening in the field?

c. What strategies do the school or college of education implement to help the IHE better 

administer the grant?

d. How is your institution monitoring students as they complete the grant program 

requirements? Or, do you have data on the overall completion of the grant requirements 

over time?

e. What data would help your institution better monitor outcomes associated with the TEACH 

Grant? 

7. Have you and your faculty discussed the reasons why students do not meet the program service and 

other Grant requirements? If so, what are those reasons?

a. Have you discussed the reasons why students might not request TEACH Grant awards in 

subsequent years? If so, what are those reasons? If no, do you have any ideas of why?

b. Have you discussed how to address those reasons? If so, have you implemented any 

strategies? Have those strategies been effective?

8. From your perspective as dean, what are the primary challenges associated with administering the 

TEACH Grant? 

9. What contextual factors, if any, at your institution affect TEACH Grant administration and support 

for grant recipients? For example, are there opportunities to provide additional support for students 

who receive TEACH Grants to find placements in schools that would fulfill the grant requirements? 

10. How do you ensure that students (who will be teaching in high-need schools) have the necessary

experiences in terms coursework, field placement, job placement, counseling, and support to be 

successful in meeting the TEACH Grant requirements?

11. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to 

know about the IHE’s implementation of the TEACH Grant and the support of TEACH Grant 

recipients that we haven’t discussed?
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Financial Aid Staff Protocol 

1. I’d like to begin by asking you to describe your role within this financial aid office as it applies to 

supporting the administration of the TEACH Grant. 

a. How long have you been in your position as financial aid officer and supporting TEACH Grant 

activities?

b. Are other staff in the financial aid office involved in administering the TEACH Grant (such as 

Grant counseling, etc.)? If so, how? 

c. What support, training, and/or guidance, did you receive in preparation for administering 

this grant as part of financial aid opportunities for students in your institution and where did 

that support/training/guidance come from? 

d. Was the training and support you received adequate? Please explain. What additional 

training or support would be helpful?

2. What is your understanding of why your institution participates in the TEACH Grant opportunity? 

How does the TEACH Grant fit within the larger context of helping students finance their education? 

For example, is this Grant often combined with other grants or loans? How does it interface with 

other financial aid and grant opportunities?

a. Do you typically encourage students who express interest in becoming teachers to apply for 

this grant? If so, why? Under what circumstances? 

b. Do you offer the opportunity to receive a TEACH Grant to students at any stage in their 

education (e.g., first year vs. third or fourth year or graduate students)?

c. In general, what does the financial aid portfolio look for students who apply for the TEACH 

Grant? Are they typically relying on multiple sources of grants? Is it typically students who 

have a high financial need or typically students with less financial aid?

3. Once students decide to apply for the grant, what steps do they need to complete to submit the 

application? Please describe any barriers in completing this process.

Probes:

a. What internal financial aid processes determine if students meet the grant eligibility 

requirements? Do you monitor whether the students meet the requirements initially and 

ongoing? Please explain.

b. How, if at all, does the financial aid office coordinate with the college/school of education to 

determine initial and ongoing eligibility?

4. Based on survey results we reviewed, the financial aid office reported that its staff informs students 

about the TEACH Grants through [fill in modes based on survey results — e.g., online email 

communications, phone, in-person/group financial aid counseling sessions]. 

How did the office decide to use these communication approaches? Please explain further: (e.g., 

cost-effectiveness, most effective way to communicate, broadest reach, etc.). Note to interviewer: 

Consider skipping this question, depending on responses from survey results.
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Probes: 

a. Please say more about how financial aid staff responsible for the implementation of the 

TEACH Grant conducts these activities to promote awareness of this grant opportunity to 

students? 

5. When the financial aid office conducts activities to inform students about the availability of these 

grants, do you find that many students already know about the TEACH Grant? To the extent that 

students already know, can you explain where they received this information?

6. Based on survey results we reviewed, your institution uses the following methods to counsel 

students [fill in, e.g., online, in-person]. Why are these modes used and how does this relate to the 

goals, approaches, and constraints of the financial aid office? 

a. How does the financial aid staff communicate with students about the requirements of the 

grant (e.g., how do you approach your discussion with students about the grant? How do 

you describe the benefits versus the requirements and how much detail do you typically go 

into? How do financial aid staff follow-up with potential applicants? Is it through scheduled 

aid packaging communications/meetings?

b. Who in the financial aid office can students contact if they have any questions once they 

have become grant recipients? To what extent do the students use this particular financial 

aid contact?

c. How does the financial aid office communicate with college/school of education faculty and 

staff about the grant requirements? 

7. Based on your interactions with students, in your opinion, how well do TEACH Grant recipients 

understand program requirements?

a. Are there other or additional activities that financial aid staff can use to help clarify or 

reinforce knowledge about the grant requirements for students?

8. As you might know, the national average grant-to-loan conversion rate is high which is what 

prompted the Department to learn more about the grant program. What do you see happening in 

your institution with grant-to-loan conversion rates? Based on interactions between financial aid 

staff and recipients, to what do you attribute this? 

Probes: 

a. What are some challenges that the financial aid office faces in administering the grant?

b. What strategies, if any, does the financial aid office use to overcome the challenges you just 

mentioned.

9. Based on observed or documented interactions between financial aid staff and recipients, would 

you discuss the reasons TEACH Grantees meet or do not meet the grant requirements (Is it because 

they stop participating or do not meet the requirements)? 

a. What reasons do students provide? Is there a common reason that students provide?

b. Do your office monitor completion of the grant requirements once student graduate? 

c. Do you share this information with the college of education dean(s), faculty, or other staff? 

Explain what data you share and how data are shared.
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10. Based on your work with students in the financial aid office, have you identified other factors 

besides the grant requirements that affect administration of the grant at the institution, financial aid 

office, or school or college of education level? 

11. Do you have any uncertainties about the TEACH Grant program and its requirements? 

a. How does this grant compare to other grant federal grant opportunities?

b. Are the TEACH Grant requirements as easy to navigate and apply for as other grant 

opportunities?

c. Are the grant requirements more stringent or less stringent than other grants?

d. Do you have any suggestions on how the Department of Education could support the 

implementation of these grants?

12. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to 

know about the financial aid office’s administration of the TEACH Grant that we haven’t discussed?
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Candidate Recruitment

for Teacher Education Programs

1. Please describe your role in the college/school of education. 

2. Please describe how the college/school of education recruits candidates for its teacher education 

programs and if there are activities recruiting candidates that pursue teaching in high-need fields in 

low-income schools.

3. The TEACH Grant program is designed to support students who are interested in teaching in highneed fields in underserved schools. Does your institution (including the school of education) use the 

TEACH Grant program to recruit students especially to pursue high-need fields in high-need schools? 

a. Describe the recruitment process, timing of recruitment activities, and how the TEACH Grant 

fits into that process.

b. Describe any teaching candidate recruitment materials that reference or incorporate 

information about the TEACH Grant. (Ask interviewee to provide copies of materials, if 

available)

c. Are there any challenges associated with using the TEACH Grant as a recruitment tool? 

Please explain. 

d. Has your teacher education program(s) been successful using the TEACH Grant as a 

recruitment tool? Please explain. Ask about specific practices used.

4. How effective is the TEACH Grant as an approach to recruit candidates into the teaching profession? 

Please explain especially as it pertains to pursuing high-need fields in high-need schools. 

a. Is the grant effective to recruit candidates to teach in high-need subjects and high-need 

schools? Please explain.

b. Are there any aspects of the grant that work as a disincentive to students as they consider 

applying for the grant? Please explain.

c. Do you collect any data on the percentage of students recruited with and without the TEACH 

Grant?

5. How could your institution better use the TEACH Grant as an approach to recruit candidates into 

their program(s)? Do you have any suggestions?

6. Do you have suggestions on how the Department of education could better support your use of the 

grant to recruit students into teaching and in high-need fields in high-need schools? 

7. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to 

know about how the TEACH Grant is used in teacher education program recruitment that we 

haven’t discussed?
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Teacher Education Program: Admissions 

1. I’d like to begin by asking you to describe your role as it relates to the school or college of 

education’s process to admit students into the teacher education program(s).

2. Please describe the teacher education program(s) admissions process. When are students expected 

to apply? Who reviews their application and makes the final decision to admit? How and when do 

they hear about acceptance into the program to which they are applying? 

a. Are there additional requirements that candidates need beyond the institution’s admissions 

requirements that are specific for admission into the college/school of education? Please 

explain. Probe to get at selectivity.

3. As an admissions officer, do you receive information about specific financial aid programs designed 

to support prospective teachers?

a. If so, can you describe how you learned about the TEACH Grant and its requirements?

4. [NOTE: This question should be linked to the survey response related to whether students must be 

admitted to a teacher education program as a prerequisite for receiving a TEACH Grant. Our 

knowledge of this should frame the opening to the question.] 

When and how, if at all, does the admissions office or admissions committee inform new teacher 

education candidates about the TEACH Grant? Please explain.

a. Prior to being admitted into the teacher education program, what steps have students 

typically taken to learn about and engage with the TEACH Grant? Have they already applied 

for the grant? [IF Yes] Are admitted students referred to any other departments or 

individuals to receive more information or assistance with the TEACH Grant? Please explain.

b. What percentage (less than a quarter, a third, half, etc.) of admitted students, would you 

say, have prior knowledge of the TEACH Grant (meaning they have heard about the grant 

before you share grant information with them).

c. How are decisions made about students who do not meet the admissions requirements when 

they apply?

d. How does the college/school of education monitor TEACH Grant recipients’ progress in 

completing coursework?

5. Would you describe the cohort of TEACH Grant students (e.g., geographic origin, and teaching 

interests (levels and subject matter)? How, if at all, have the cohorts changed over the course of the 

grant administration?

6. From the perspective and experience of using the TEACH Grant within the admissions process, 

would you describe any major challenges or best practices related to the use of the TEACH Grant?

a. [If used as a recruitment strategy:] If you regard the TEACH Grant as an opportunity to recruit 

students and have used it in that way, what challenges have you experienced? What improvements

could be made to accomplish your goals? Based on your experience, what practices or policies at 

the IHE or school level would facilitate the use of the grant program in this way?

7. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to know 

about the TEACH Grant as part of the admissions and selection process that we haven’t discussed?
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Teacher Education Program: Student 

Advisement and Counseling 

1. I’d like to begin by asking you to describe your role (or generally the role of faculty and staff) 

advising and counseling students within the school or college of education’s teacher education 

program(s).

2. Can you describe the advising and counseling provided to students at your institution, specifically as 

it relates to the TEACH Grant?

a. When students are admitted into a program, when are they assigned an advisor? 

b. How is advisor and advisee assignment determined? How often do students meet with 

advisors? 

c. What type(s) of information do advisors provide to students? 

3. As a member of the student advisement/counseling staff, how do you receive information about 

financial aid designed to support education costs for prospective teachers?

a. How did you learn about the TEACH Grant in particular?

4. The TEACH Grant is designed to support students who are interested in teaching in high-need fields 

in underserved schools. Is there specific guidance or counseling about the TEACH Grant that teacher 

education program advisors provide to students, either before or after they apply for the grant? 

Please explain. 

a. Probe for information as to whether student advisors provide information, and what type of 

information, on grants and scholarships, including the TEACH Grant.

b. Probe to inquire about certain information, tools, resources, or other individuals to whom 

advisors refer a student, particularly about the grant. 

5. If not answered already: Are you involved in the advisement of teacher education program students 

to field placement and job opportunities? If yes, how do advisors work with students to ensure that 

their opportunities align with the requirements of the TEACH Grant? Please explain.

6. As an advisor, do you monitor student progress in fulfilling the requirements related to the TEACH 

Grant? If not, does anyone else in the college/school of education monitor progress of fulfilling 

those requirements? 

7. Do you have any suggestions that could help other student advisors provide advisement and 

counseling to students about the TEACH Grant and its requirements?

8. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to 

know about student advising and counseling as it relates to the TEACH Grant within your school or 

college of education teacher education program(s) that we haven’t discussed?
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Field Study and Student Teaching Placement

1. I’d like to begin by asking you to describe your role (or generally the role of faculty and staff) in 

placing and mentoring students in student teaching and field study placements.

2. Describe how field study placement and student teaching and mentoring work across your school or 

college of education’s teacher education program(s). 

3. Who is responsible for making decisions about student teaching and field study placements?

a. Are there others who participate in those decisions? If so, how?

4. From the perspective of placing students for student teaching, what school or classroom factors, 

cooperating teacher criteria, or characteristics of students does the school or college of education 

consider in determining the best fit for student teaching?

Probe:

a. Are TEACH Grant recipients assured student teaching in high-need subjects and schools?

b. Are TEACH Grant recipients assured field study placement in high-need fields and high-need 

schools?

5. Does the university have a partnership(s) with specific local education agencies (LEAs) to facilitate 

the placement of students into classrooms for their student teaching assignments? 

a. Probe for names of LEAs, students served at LEAs, and so on.

b. In which school districts or schools do most of your candidates complete their student 

teaching?

6. You mentioned a partnership with X school districts. 

Describe how TEACH Grant recipients’ service requirements are taken into consideration when 

placing students in these school districts or schools.

Probe for information on whether these school districts or schools are ones in which TEACH Grant 

recipients could fulfill their service requirements.

7. Does your program face challenges in terms of student teaching and field study placements? For 

example, in some districts, student teaching is only done in a subset of schools or with a limited 

number of cooperating teachers. Are you able to place all TEACH Grantees in student teaching and 

field study placements that address their grant requirements? If not, what would you estimate is the 

percentage of students you are able to place so they can gain the experience they need?

8. As the field study and student teaching placement coordinator, what additional challenges do you 

face with placements and what solutions have you found to some of those challenges? Please 

explain.

9. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to 

know about the experiences you and your school or college has had regarding student teaching and 

field study placement and student teacher mentoring as it relates to the TEACH Grant that we 

haven’t discussed?
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Teacher Education Program:

Job Placement 

1. I’d like to begin by asking you to describe your role assisting teacher candidates who have 

successfully completed their program requirements in the job search and hiring process).

a. Is this role shared by others in the school or college of education? If so, is there a common 

approach used by everyone who assists students? Please describe.

2. Please explain how your program and institution support teaching candidates with job search and 

placement as they are preparing to graduate or after graduation.

a. As a job placement coordinator, how do you learn about teaching candidates who are TEACH 

Grant recipients?

b. Does [name of institution] have partnerships with districts to facilitate the hiring of TEACH 

Grant recipients in high-need schools? How do these partnerships work?

c. Are there other ways such a partnership can support new hires with the successful 

completion of TEACH Grant requirements (such as ongoing mentoring for the challenges of 

the first year or two or three of teaching)?

3. If not already answered: As a faculty member or staff in the school or college of education working 

with students in the hiring process, when do you begin working with students to support their 

search for full-time teaching positions? What steps do you take with or in support of students to 

accomplish this goal?

4. Where are the majority of your teaching program candidates hired? Can you describe the 

geographic and demographic characteristics of these school districts? Is this also where program 

completers who are trained to teach in high-need schools/TEACH Grant recipients typically get 

hired?

a. Probe for names of LEAs, students served at LEAs, number of high-need schools, and so on. 

Listen for information on whether the LEAs and schools meet TEACH Grant requirements. 

Listen for contextual factors that are beyond the control of the IHE.

b. In your opinion, are there local labor market factors that might impact whether teaching 

candidates complete the service requirements for the TEACH Grant? 

5. In your opinion as a person who assists students in job placement, to what degree do the TEACH 

Grant requirements influence teaching candidates’ job search strategies when looking for full-time 

teaching positions? Please explain.

a. For example, in the job search, how do candidates successfully find the schools where they 

can fulfill TEACH Grant requirements? Probe for teaching candidate understanding of the 

service requirements and the degree to which the job placement coordinator helps grant 

recipients find eligible positions. 

6. When you’re working with students to identify full-time teaching opportunities, to what extent have 

you found the TEACH Grant requirements are influencing candidates’ decisions to pursue teaching in 

a high-need field at a high-need school? Please explain.
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7. From your perspective as a job placement coordinator, what are the barriers or challenges 

candidates face when looking for a full-time teaching position that will fulfill the TEACH Grant 

requirements? Please explain.

8. As a job placement coordinator, have you identified and/or implemented any strategies to help 

teaching candidates obtain jobs in TEACH Grant eligible schools? Please explain.

9. Does your school or college of education have information or knowledge of student employment 

after they complete their degree requirements and teacher certification requirements? If yes, ask 

the following questions:

a. Do you use this information to support grant recipients post-graduation (e.g., do you follow 

up with recipients with reminders of how many years of service are left agreement to serve)?

b. Do you know how soon after students are hired and are teaching after they graduate from 

your teacher preparation program(s)? 

c. About what percentage would you say become a classroom teacher within one or two years 

after completing their degree?

d. Do TEACH Grant recipients typically find employment with the districts where they complete 

their student teaching?

e. On average, how long do your candidates remain in the classroom? 

f. On average, how long do your candidates remain teaching in their first school? 

g. What percentage of TEACH Grant recipients obtain teaching jobs in high-need fields and 

high-need schools? 

10. Thank you for your time today. Before we end, are there any other things you would like me to 

know about the teaching candidate’s job placement in regard to the TEACH Grant program that we 

haven’t discussed?

The Department of Education’s mission is to promote student achievement and preparation 

for global competitiveness by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access. 

www.ed.gov