Pilot Project: Teacher Evaluation Systems

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Project Completed.

This project has been completed.

 

  • This Pilot Project took place in the summer of 2009 and is now closed.
  • 36 participants from across the country collaborated to develop policy recommendations for improving teacher evaluation systems.
  • You can see much of the work of the team here, though some work was conducted offline.
  • The team's work resulted in "Policy 2.0: Using Open Innovation to Improve Teacher Evaluation Systems," which included eight recommendations for improving teacher evaluation systems:
  1. Objective measures of student achievement gains must be a major component of teacher evaluation.
  2. Clearly defined standards of quality instruction should be used to assess a teacher’s classroom performance.
  3. Teachers, teacher groups and unions should be included in developing and implementing teacher evaluation systems.
  4. Teacher evaluation systems themselves must be periodically evaluated and refined.
  5. Teacher evaluation systems should reflect the importance of supportive administrators and school environment to effective teaching.
  6. Components of teacher evaluation that rely on observation and discussion must be in the hands of instructional leaders who have sufficient expertise, training and capacity.
  7. Evaluations must differentiate levels of teaching efficacy to identify opportunities for professional growth, and drive rewards and consequences.
  8. Information from teacher evaluations should be comparable across schools and districts, and should be used to address equity in the distribution of teaching talent.

 

Clearly defined standards of quality instruction should be used to assess a teacher’s classroom performance.
Teachers, teacher groups and unions should be included in developing and implementing teacher evaluation systems.
Teacher evaluation systems themselves must be periodically evaluated and refined.
Teacher evaluation systems should reflect the importance of supportive administrators and school environment to effective teaching.
Components of teacher evaluation that rely on observation and discussion must be in the hands of instructional leaders who have sufficient expertise, training and capacity.
Evaluations must differentiate levels of teaching efficacy to identify opportunities for professional growth, and drive rewards and consequences.
Information from teacher evaluations should be comparable across schools and districts, and should be used to address equity in the distribution of teaching talent.
  • Read the full report here.

Project Overview

The majority of teacher evaluation systems in this country result in nearly all teachers being rated satisfactory, despite the fact that many schools are not meeting federal benchmarks for success.  Evaluation systems are rarely linked to quality, targeted professional development to address improvement areas for teachers.  Administrators are often not trained to conduct robust evaluations, nor held accountable for the results of their current systems.

Teacher and administrator input is an important component of teacher evaluation system design, and Hope Street Group is uniquely positioned to bring these voices to the conversation. By including educators as key participants in our policy work, we will ensure solutions are pre-vetted by the community they are designed to impact.  Robust evaluation systems linked to quality professional development and designed with teacher input will lead to greater job satisfaction and more efficient instructional systems.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) requires that states and districts report distribution of ratings teachers receive under current evaluation systems. At the same time, the ARRA Race to the Top and Innovation Funds will encourage and incentivize revisions to these systems. We would like to seize this window of opportunity to transform evaluation systems, establishing recommendations for a system that will accurately and fairly evaluate the performance of teachers. Policy makers will look for specific, practical ideas for improvements.  Hope Street Group’s policy team can provide these ideas and be part of the solution.

Check out Project Process for more details about the project's structure.

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