Note to NEA RA. Two more pieces on testing for accountability and evaluation.

The NEA proposal for a policy statement on teacher accountability and evaluation calls on locals to consider student test scores to be used for teacher performance reviews.

Two items delegates might take a look at.

From the Economic Policy Institute:

While there are good reasons for concern about the current system of teacher evaluation, there are also good reasons to be concerned about claims that measuring teachers’ effectiveness largely by student test scores will lead to improved student achievement. If new laws or policies specifically require that teachers be fired if their students’ test scores do not rise by a certain amount, then more teachers might
well be terminated than is now the case. But there is not strong evidence to indicate either that the departing teachers would actually be the weakest teachers, or that the departing teachers would be replaced by more effective ones. There is also little or no evidence for the claim that teachers will be more motivated to improve student learning if teachers are evaluated or monetarily rewarded for student
test score gains.

From the Great Lakes Policy Center:

It is well established that teacher quality makes a difference in student learning. Since the implementation of No Child Left Behind in 2002, staffing every classroom with a high-quality teacher has been an official national priority. That goal entails an implicit requirement to assess teacher and teaching quality more rigorously than has been the case in the past. Despite decades of research on how best to assess teacher performance, however, no consensus has evolved on any single assessment strategy or collection of strategies—indicating that the problem of designing adequate and appropriate assessment is inherently complex and controversial. Such complexity has not, however, prevented the Obama administration from encouraging policymakers to define “good” teachers as those who produce gains in student achievement, measured by gains in standardized test scores.

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