By aggregating residual gain scores (the differences between each student's current score and a predicted score based on prior performance) for a school or a teacher, value-added models (VAMs) can be used to generate estimates of school or teacher effects. It is known that random errors in the prior scores will introduce bias into predictions of…

Contemporary teacher evaluation systems are built upon multiple measures including, primarily, teacher-level value-added and observational estimates. While researchers have conducted examinations of these systems and indicators, researchers have not investigated how using these systems might distort the validity of the inferences being drawn,…

Prior research has not investigated perceived added education value in courses. Using a sample of 165 graduating business students, two business administration (BA) scales were created from six required BA core courses as part of students' Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree. Students were asked if each required course "added…

We study the relative performance of two policy-relevant value-added models--a one-step fixed effect model and a two-step aggregated residuals model--using a simulated data set well grounded in the value-added literature. A key feature of our data generating process is that student achievement depends on a continuous measure of economic…

An increasing emphasis on principals as key to school improvement has contributed to efforts to elevate principal effectiveness that have taken various forms across the US. The primacy of the state as the focal point of educational reform elevates the value of understanding commonalities and differences among states in characteristics of…

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…

Anecdotal evidence points to the importance of school principals, but the limited existing research has neither provided consistent results nor indicated any set of essential characteristics of effective principals. This paper exploits extensive student-level panel data across six states to investigate both variations in principal performance and…

Ohio recognizes that high-quality teachers come from high-quality teacher preparation programs. To help improve the quality of educator preparation programs in Ohio, H.B. 1 of the 128th General Assembly directed the Chancellor of the Ohio Department of Higher Education to develop a system for evaluating Ohio's educator preparation programs (ORC…

Understanding teacher learning, and relations between that learning and practice, has become a research priority in the quest for quality. Managerial policy discourses that commodify teachers as academic capital encourage institutions to adopt linear models of professional learning and development (PLD) as auditable value-adding, yet this…

Texas provides a unique opportunity to examine teachers without standard university preparation, for it prepares more teachers through alternative pathways than any other state. We find two advantages for mathematics and science teachers prepared in the standard way. First, since 2008 they have been staying in the classroom longer than those who…

This paper reports on a study of collaborative group work in mathematics. Although collaborative group work is known as one of the important approaches in education, it is still uncertain how group thinking can be measured in various learning contexts. We used the Group Thinking Measure (GTM) test developed by [Wegerif, R., T. Fujita, J. Doney, J.…

Students' abilities are multidimensional; teachers and schools shape students' cognitive skills, most often captured by test scores, but they also shape students' non-cognitive skills such as character, tolerance, effort, and conscientiousness. This study reviews the evidence indicating disconnects between test scores and non-cognitive skills from…

We examine the relationship between district level student achievement and teacher average salary in Ohio from academic year 2013-14 to academic year 2018-19. Utilizing panel data, the following district level characteristics were controlled for: average teacher experience, average teacher degree-level, student socioeconomic status, race, student…

This study was designed to assess the impact of providing teachers and principals with performance feedback on instructional practice, principal leadership, and student achievement. The teacher and principal performance feedback that was the focus of the study's intervention incorporated promising features of educator performance measures…

We examine the relationship between absenteeism and achievement since the onset of COVID-19. Applying first-differences models to North Carolina administrative data, we estimate that each absence was associated with a 0.0032 standard deviation (SD) decline in math achievement in 2022-23. As students averaged 3.3 more absences in 2022-23 than…