Local education agencies (LEAs) continue to use value-added models (VAMs) for teacher evaluation policies and purposes, often with consequences attached. Although the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) provides more flexibility to LEAs, few have discontinued VAM use, suggesting they interpret VAMs as a valid measure of teacher effectiveness. In…

The success of many students with disabilities (SWDs) depends on access to high-quality general education teachers. Yet, most measures of teacher value-added measures (VAM) fail to distinguish between a teacher's effectiveness in educating students with and without disabilities. We create two VAM measures: one focusing on teachers' effectiveness…

The effect of remote learning on student performance has been a frequent topic of research and discussion in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, yet little is known about the impact of remote instruction on the performance of teachers. This study documents how relative effectiveness of teachers changed when moving from in-person to remote…

The success of students with disabilities (SWDs) depends on access to high-quality general education teachers. Yet, teacher value-added measures (VAMs) generally fail to distinguish between effectiveness in educating students with or without disabilities. Using data from the Los Angeles Unified School District, we create two VAMs: one focusing on…

States are responsible for setting and evaluating the standards that teacher preparation programs (TPPs) must meet for accreditation. Despite the considerable investment that states make in this process, no prior research has linked the ratings of TPPs generated by program reviews to inservice teacher performance. In this paper, we describe…

Empirical results are consistent with the hypothesis that socioeconomic factors contribute to initial disparities in performance that are perpetuated by demoralizing grading, testing, and grouping practices throughout the K-12 years. The hypothesis may explain why the achievement gap increases after children enter the school system, why Black…

We investigate the predictive validity of teacher licensure tests using data from the Massachusetts Tests for Educator Licensure (MTEL). MTEL scores predict teachers' in-service performance ratings and contributions to student test scores (i.e., value added). We then explore whether these relationships vary for teacher candidates of color.…

For decades, school districts across the Nation have been pressured to close the achievement gap among students and have been held accountable for student outcomes. According to past researchers, there is a need to revise completely the teacher evaluation practices used in the 1980s and 1990s to better measure teacher effectiveness. More recently,…

Having good teachers in the classroom matters, and in recent years better data have helped researchers more accurately measure individual teachers' effects on their pupils. A novel RAND study goes further, finding that teachers' effectiveness (or lack thereof) ripples out beyond their own students and affects the educational experiences of their…

As teacher quality is judged and tenured teachers are rated ineffective, educators are challenging teacher evaluation systems in the courts as they adversely affect their employment. Teachers have lost jobs, pay, tenure, and career advancement. This article reports on these cases, providing an interpretation in light of court cases about teacher…

Research has begun to investigate whether teachers and schools are as effective with certain student subgroups as they are with the overall student population. Most of this research has examined the issue by trying to produce causal estimates of school contributions to short-term student growth (usually using value-added models) and has emphasized…

The conventional view is that the origin of the black-white student achievement gap can be traced to sociocultural and socioeconomic factors, plus variation in parental style and parental investment, and is maintained and perpetuated by variation in school and teacher quality. This article rejects the conventional view, drawing upon the results of…

We examine how teachers from two alternative preparation programs--Teach for America (TFA) and Kansas City Teacher Residency (KCTR)--contribute to the teacher labor market in and around Kansas City, Missouri. We show that TFA and KCTR teachers are more likely than other teachers to work in charter schools, and more broadly, in schools with high…

Surveys of teacher preparation program (TPP) completers have become one widely used measure for program accountability and improvement, yet there is little evidence as to whether perceptions of preparation experiences predict the workforce outcomes of teachers. In the present study, we use statewide completer survey data from North Carolina to…

This study investigated teacher evaluation practices used in Indiana as the state was implementing a mandated teacher evaluation system (Public Law 90) and early reporting of subsequent teacher effectiveness results by the Indiana Department of Education. The study surveyed public school administrators: (a) superintendents, (b) special education…