1. STUDENT TEST SCORES AND TEACHER EVALUATION A brief overview

2. REALLY?

3. VALUE-ADDED MODELING Value-Added Modeling (VAM) seeks to measure teacher effectiveness VAM attempts to eliminate confounding variables such as socio-economic status and prior level of achievement VAMs sometimes analyze student performance at previous grade levels to predict student performance at the current grade level given current progress rate There is no one model which VAM’s follow (RAND Education)

4. EXAMPLE OF VAM Subjects: Students in Class A, a 10 th grade reading class Data is collected from the reading test scores of these students in 8 th and 9 th grade Other data collected includes: socio-economic status and class placement The change between 8 th and 9 th grade is noted This change and other factors are used to predict a score for 10 th grade The teacher’s VAM reflects the difference between predicted score and actual score in 10 th grade Predicted score higher than actual score = lower VAM for teacher Predicted score lower than actual score = lower VAM for teacher

5. USE OF VAM TO EVALUATE TEACHERS VAM scores have been used to evaluate teachers for only a short period of time Short period of time = little historical precedent to evaluate VAM has commonly comprised up to 40% of overall evaluation of teachers in areas where it has been employed Washington D.C. school district fired teachers for poor performance. 165 fired in 2010 (Banchero, 2010) 206 fired in 2011(Turque, 2011) 98 fired in 2012 (Brown, 2012)

6. PROBLEMS WITH VAM Contemporary articles show that VAM is a hotly contested subject Many argue that VAM does not fully account for differences in socio- economic status VAM’s detractors also argue that there can be ‘cross-pollination’ which VAM cannot detect ‘Cross-pollination’ is the idea that a teacher of another subject may have influenced a student more than the teacher in the primary subject A social studies teacher may prove more influential in a student’s ability to write than an English teacher; however, the English teacher will receive the credit (Baker, 2010)

7. VAM AND TEACHER FIRING At the end of the 2010 school year, 165 teachers in Washington D.C.’s public schools were fired over students’ low test scores Chicago and Houston are larger cities where the use of VAM was contested by teachers and teacher’s unions Teacher’s unions have ferociously opposed the use of VAM for evaluation of teachers Washington D.C. has placed the use of VAM to evaluate teachers on hold until the Common Core is fully in-place and understood