AIMS Teacher Evaluation Review

1. AIMS Teacher Evaluation Review Our Teacher Effectiveness “Quality Control” Is Broken June 2010

2. A Reflection over the Last 100 Years • 1900 Teacher evaluations mostly @ personal qualities (grooming, articulation, confidence, etc.) • 1950’s Teacher evaluations mimic industry appraisals (checklists, inventories, etc.), getting more formalized in nature. • Mid-1960’s Coleman et al. (1966) Unflattering study on the effects of schools • 1970’s Madeline Hunter influenced Teacher Evaluations • 1980‘s Rand Studies cast doubt on Teacher Evaluations (Darling-Hammond, 1983). • Late-1980’s More studies cast doubt (100 district study) • 1990’s Danielson’s Framework (1996) • 1996 100 district study replicated – no change/improvement • Mid-1990’s -now Teacher Effectiveness studies start emerging, showing profound impact of teachers on student learning • Now CLASH! of subpar (lousy) teacher evaluation/improvement systems WITH Knowledge of Teachers Quality Importance!

3. Concerns and Attention Mount • Policy Papers & Foundation Efforts • Education Sector’s (2008) Rush to Judgment • New Teacher Project’s (2009) Widget Effect • Center for American Progress (2009) “So Long, Lake Wobegone” • Gates Foundation funds 4-site effort to develop teacher effectiveness measures • Policy • State Fiscal Stabilization Funds (4 assurances, Great teachers/leaders) • LEA’s might use SFSF money to “[establish] fair and reliable evaluation systems that provide feedback, help educators improve, and ensure that poor performers are dismissed” • Race to the Top (4 assurances) went further .. • (D)(2) Improving teacher and principal effectiveness based on performance (58 points) • White House ESEA Reauthorization Recommendations • American Federation of Teachers (2010)

4. Summary of Teacher Evaluation Problems • All teachers are rated as good or great. Because of this… • Excellent performance goes unnoticed • Typical goes without support to improve further • Chronically low performing goes unaddressed • Results of Teacher Evaluation have little/no impact on HR decisions • Retention, promotion, placement, compensation, professional development, tenure, etc. • Result: Schools’ #1 factor for making a difference with students is treated indifferently, so education’s effect on student outcomes is likely compromised (heavily?)

5. Guidance for Improving Teacher Evaluation • Professional Evaluation Standards • State Law • Evaluation Purposes

6. Guidance for Improving Teacher Evaluation • Personnel Evaluation Standards for Education • Joint Committee on Standards for Educational Evaluation (1988, 2009) , comprising 14 professional educational organizations • Created out of widespread dissatisfaction with quality of personnel evaluation in education • Four broad standard areas organizing 27 sub-standards • Proprietary Standards: legal, ethical, respectful for all parties • Utility Standards: informative, timely, and impactful • Feasibility Standards: “Do-able” financially, politically, time-wise • Accuracy Standards: technically sound, methodological rigor and fit, etc. • Standards without Assessments? • Almost a decade after these standards were introduced, little evidence surfaced that districts had improved their evaluation practices.

7. Guidance for Improving Teacher Evaluation • Tennessee Law: “First to the Top” (2010) • 15-member TEAC: • charged with making recommendations about guidelines and criteria for the annual evaluation of all teachers to state BOE • 2011-2012 first year to implement • 50% of evaluation informed by student performance (35% of which informed by TVAAS where available) • Evaluation information must be a factor in HR decisions

8. Guidance for Improving Teacher Evaluation • Evaluation Purposes: • Very similar to assessment practices, teacher evaluation systems need to serve two purposes: summative and formative. • Formative evaluation systems need to live in an error-tolerant context, where risk-taking is encouraged, honest acknowledgement of weaknesses is valued, and descriptive feedback is plentiful. These are pathways to growth … • However, these conditions don’t (can’t) likely exist in a summative evaluation context, because its purpose is to make employment decisions, where acknowledgement of shortcomings can be “fatal.” • Popham (1988) writes very clearly that teacher evaluation systems that blend these two purposes into one system are futile. • To attempt to serve both purposes in the same manner is to do neither very well

10. Suggestions for an Improved System 1) Annually evaluate all teachers 2) Have dual, separate, but equally important subsystems, each to inform either the summative or formative reason for evaluating teachers 3) Include student learning information 4) Use multiple assessors, outside evaluators, peer reviewers to mitigate against inflated ratings 5) Real consequences need to stem from the summative role of teacher evaluations 6) Include a valid training regimen for evaluators before they use whatever protocol is chosen 7) Include a comprehensive, professionally designed marketing and communications plan 8) Provide multiple, valid methodologies for improvement 9) Be “doable”

11. www.BattelleforKids.org