Teacher Evaluations: Don’t Begin Assembly Until You Have All The Parts
Over the past year or two, roughly 15-20 states have passed or are considering legislation calling for the overhaul of teacher evaluation. The central feature of most of these laws is a mandate to incorporate measures of student test score growth, in most cases specifying a minimum percentage of a teacher’s total score that must consist of these estimates.
There’s some variation across states, but the percentages are all quite high. For example, Florida and Coloradoboth require that at least 50 percent of an evaluation must be based on growth measures, while New Yorkmandates a minimum of 40 percent. These laws also vary in terms of other specifics, such as the degree to which the growth measure proportion must be based on state tests (rather than other assessments), how much flexibility districts have in designing their systems, and how teachers in untested grades and subjects are evaluated. But they all share that defining feature of mandating a minimum proportion – or “weight” – that must