The vast majority of teachers in K–12 public schools are female, including over 85 percent of those in the elementary grades. Amid ongoing concerns that boys are struggling in school, one proposed solution is to recruit more male teachers. But does gender matching of students and teachers really benefit kids? A new working paper aims to find out, focusing on elementary grade levels.
Theorizing that some previous research on the topic had been limited in scope—and thus unable to reach any concrete conclusions—a team of researchers led by Eric Hengyu Hu of the State University of New York at Albany worked to construct the strongest possible methodology. This included a nationally-representative sample of students, multi-year tracking, an examination of both academic and non-academic outcomes, and controls for a number of potential confounding variables. Data came from NCES’ Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010-11 (ECLS-K: 2011). Researchers observed this nationally-representative cohort of students—4,080 boys and 3,890 girls—through the end of fifth grade. For academic outcomes, data included individually administered, untimed, “psychometrically well-validated” measures of reading, mathematics, and science achievement. Non-academic outcomes were two-fold: behavioral ratings, as provided by teachers via the Social Skills Rating System (SSRS); and executive function ratings, assessed by NCES field staff as part of ECLS-K protocol. It is, unfortunately, not noted anywhere in the report how many male or female teachers were observed.
For the full sample, the researchers observed no statistically significant effect of student-teacher gender matching on students’ academic achievement, social-behavioral, or executive functioning. Girls taught by female teachers did receive higher ratings on interpersonal skills and approaches to learning, two subcategories of SSRS, but all other outcomes showed null effects. Boys taught by male teachers showed null effects across the board. Breaking down the findings by race and ethnicity revealed a significant boost in the area of cognitive flexibility (one aspect of executive functioning) for Black girls taught by female teachers and Asian boys taught by male teachers. However, significant negative effects were also found for Black girls (lower science achievement) and Asian boys (reduced interpersonal skills).
Study co-author Paul Morgan said in an interview that he was surprised by the findings. “I’ve raised two boys and my assumption would be that having male teachers is beneficial because boys tend to be more rambunctious, more active, a little less easy to direct in academic tasks.” Indeed, one well-known analysis focusing on eighth grade students showed that having a female teacher benefitted girls and disadvantaged boys in science, social studies, and English, and created a gender gap that was 8 percent of a standard deviation. However, the author concluded that some of this effect might have occurred in previous years, depending on the gender matching (or lack thereof) in early grades.
Morgan, Hu, and their fellow researchers conclude similarly in their report that, “rather than providing definitive evidence of ‘no effect,’” their findings highlight the need for even larger samples, more outcomes to measure, and even more controls for confounding variables such as changes in parental involvement over time, peer composition, or classroom assignment processes over time. The need for additional study is especially true since the mechanisms at work are likely indirect—such as role modeling and reduction of teacher perception bias. “We’re not saying gender matching doesn’t work,” Morgan added. “We’re saying we’re not observing it in K through fifth grade.” But they haven’t stopped looking.
SOURCE: Eric Hengyu Hu, et al., “Fixed Effect Estimates of Teacher-Student Gender Matching During Elementary School,” working paper, accessed via ResearchGate (November 2025).
