Update on Teacher Effectiveness and Teacher Evaluation

This past week, there were two major reports published that would be of interest to readers who are following the Kentucky work on development of a teacher effectiveness rubric and teacher evaluation system.

Kentucky began this work as part of the Race to the Top application. We have continued the work; however, the timeline has been altered. We are field-testing the rubric this year, and the Teacher Effectiveness Steering Committee is meeting often to revise and edit based on feedback from teachers, principals, superintendents and other stakeholders.

We hope to pilot a teacher effectiveness rubric and multiple evidences during the 2011-12 school year in as many as 50 districts and conduct a full state pilot in the 2012-13 school year.

From the Brookings Brown Center on Education Policy came a report about use of value-added measures in a teacher evaluation system. The report highlighted four areas of confusion about value-added.

* Public or non-public display of the data is a separate debate from whether or not to use value-added.
* Teacher consequences and student consequences from using a value-added component are not always congruent.
* Reliability of value-added measures are about as reliable as other performance measures for high-stakes decisions.
* Value-added not included in an evaluation system usually lowers the reliability of personnel decisions.

While I am not promoting the report, I do believe it offers some important points for consideration by our steering committee. For a copy of the report, visit http://www.brookings.edu/reports/2010/1117_evaluating_teachers.aspx.

Another interesting report came from the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) - Transforming Teacher Education Through Clinical Practice: A National Strategy to Prepare Effective Teachers. This report starts by saying the education of teachers in the U.S. needs to be turned upside down. The report recommends a shift away from academic preparation and course work loosely linked to school-based experiences. The report also recommends more clinical practice interwoven with academic content and professional courses. To view the report, visit this link:
http://www.ncate.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=zzeiB1OoqPk%3d&tabid=715

The Kentucky work is progressing slowly, but I believe the final product will be one that all stakeholders can support. Most of all, the product will be one that will help more teachers help more students achieve success.