If it’s not valid, reliability doesn’t matter so much! More on VAM-ing & SGP-ing Teacher Dismissal « School Finance 101

If it’s not valid, reliability doesn’t matter so much! More on VAM-ing & SGP-ing Teacher Dismissal « School Finance 101:

If it’s not valid, reliability doesn’t matter so much! More on VAM-ing & SGP-ing Teacher Dismissal

by schoolfinance101

This post includes a few more preliminary musings regarding the use of value-added measures and student growth percentiles for teacher evaluation, specifically for making high-stakes decisions, and especially in those cases where new statutes and regulations mandate rigid use/heavy emphasis on these measures, as I discussed in the previous post.
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The recent release of New York City teacher value-added estimates to several media outlets stimulated much discussion about standard errors and statistical noise found in estimates of teacher effectiveness derived from the city’s value-added model.  But lost in that discussion was any emphasis on whether the predicted value-added measures were valid estimates of teacher effects to begin with.  That is, did they actually represent what they were intended to represent – the teacher’s influence on a true measure of student achievement, or learning growth while under that teacher’s tutelage.  As framed in teacher evaluation legislation, that measure is typically characterized as “student achievement growth,” and it is assumed that one can measure the influence of the teacher on “student achievement growth” in a particular content domain.
A brief note on the semantics versus the statistics and measurement in

Disposable Teachers | Dissident Voice

Disposable Teachers | Dissident Voice:

Disposable Teachers

by Paul Haeder

It’s the equal pay for equal work thing, stupid. Union strong and proud. (Bumper sticker on 1972 VW Rabbit, Vancouver, Canada).
Sure, that might be the mantra for the New Faculty Majority, but in a large sense, the fight to normalize the work, pay and benefits of part-time/contingent/temporary/migratory/irregular/at-will/auxiliary faculty, AKA “freeway fliers,” is one centered on dismantling the two-tiered system of inequitable pay and punitive treatment between tenure track faculty and non-tenure track faculty.
At one school where I recently taught, Green River Community College in Auburn, Washington, the battle for the minds and hearts of students is fought with almost 70 percent of the faculty hitched to the quasi-indentured servitude label, “adjunct.”
My fellow colleague, philosophy adjunct Keith Hoeller, lives a typical story of teaching 20 years at 10 colleges to cobble together a living. “The use of adjunct faculty is higher education’s way of outsourcing,” he recently said.
For this Puget Sound region, all 3.3 million of us, the April 20 teach-in – “The Solution to Faculty Apartheid” – was somewhat historic, so says several faculty involved in the break-away group of adjunct instructors organizing this event. A few of the GRAFA members – Green River Adjunct Faculty Association – have been teaching at GRCC for more than two decades each.
The two speakers both had global and localized perspectives on adjuncts – Frank Cosco with Vancouver Community College Faculty Association and Jack Longmate, Olympic College English instructor who is at the

Justice-as-Truth Legal Argument

by W'Lawpsh

Justice as fairness is intended as a political conception of justice. While a political conception of justice is, of course, a moral conception, it is a moral conception worked out for a specific kind of subject, namely, for political,
social, and economic institutions.
– John Rawls (1921-2002)

PART 1. Pictorial Argument
There were many massacres of Indian peoples before the advent of photography. There is also a famous set of photographs regarding the event of December 29, 1890, known to Indians as the Massacre at Wounded Knee and to the United States government as the Battle of Wounded Knee. Some of these in conjunction with the moccasin telegraph taught a lesson not to be forgotten to the still-surviving illiterate tribes if North America: the end of times was upon them and the unity with which they identify. Some of the photographs are reproduced below. Please try to see them as they would have been seen and still are perceived by the Indian peoples, perhaps even before considering the text that accompanies them at Wikipedia, Wounded Knee Massacre.
          PART 2. Written Argument
(1). The Declaration of Independence settled that one People has no right to possess another’s homeland or to dictate how the other shall govern itself, and the Constitution of the United States of America gave certain Peoples direct access to the Supreme Court of the United States to enforce that STRUCTURALLY-CRITICAL fundamental principle.
(2). Specifically, the Commerce Clause enacts Congress can regulate trade with “foreign Nations and Indian Tribes”, those being the two explicitly-identified categories of other sovereign Peoples organized as States for 

The Innovative Educator: The Hottest Posts That Everyone is Talking About This Week on The Innovative Educator!

The Innovative Educator: The Hottest Posts That Everyone is Talking About This Week on The Innovative Educator!:

The Hottest Posts That Everyone is Talking About This Week on The Innovative Educator!

by noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Nielsen)

Here’s the roundup of what's been popular on The Innovative Educator blog this week. Below you’ll see the top weekly posts along with the number of pageviews. I hope there's something that looks of interest to you.  If it does, check it out. If you’re inspired, share it with others and/or leave a comment.

9 Ways to Assess without Standardized Tests

Apr 22, 2012, 10 comments                      5,232 Pageviews

The bad pineapple questions are not the problem wi...

Apr 23, 2012, 4 comments                           3853 Pageviews

NY Principals are Speaking Out Against Standardized Tests...

Apr 25, 2012, 2 comments                           2653 Pageviews

Suffering in Silence… Teacher speaks out against standardized tests...

Apr 26, 2012, 5 comments                           2096 Pageviews

Inform Others of the Harm of Standardized Tests...

Apr 24, 2012, 2 comments                           1947 Pageviews

Tell Bully Principal How You Feel

Apr 19, 2012, 130 comments                     1,798 Pageviews

World’s simplest online safety policy

Apr 3, 2011, 11 comments                       1,599 Pageviews

8 Real Ways Facebook Enriched 1st grade class...

Jul 15, 2010, 21 comments                          1297 Pageviews

Rick Scott Robbed Peter to Pay Paul to Get JD Alexander His University | Scathing Purple Musings

Rick Scott Robbed Peter to Pay Paul to Get JD Alexander His University | Scathing Purple Musings:

Rick Scott Robbed Peter to Pay Paul to Get JD Alexander His University

by Bob Sikes

USF Poly Tech is in Senator Paula Dockery’s home town. From the start, Dockery knew that JD Alexander’s desire for an independent Poly Tech was a bad idea. But Dockery must be appalled by the crony capitalism that delivered Alexander his little fiefdom, and Rick Scott’s role in the unseemly episode is looking more unseemly as events unfold. Dockery writes about an ongoing conversation she had with a UF student on Facebook in aFlorida Voices column:

It arrived a week before Gov. Rick Scott signed a bill separating USF Poly into a separate 12th university, without ever giving its 1,300 students and 100 faculty members the courtesy of a meeting.
Despite overwhelming opposition, the governor said he signed the bill because “the primary 

The Lesson of the Cupcakes: Fix Schools by Resisting Gimmicks and Heeding Evidence | National Education Policy Center

The Lesson of the Cupcakes: Fix Schools by Resisting Gimmicks and Heeding Evidence | National Education Policy Center:

The Lesson of the Cupcakes: Fix Schools by Resisting Gimmicks and Heeding Evidence

 

Share6

by Kevin G. Welner

April 25, 2012

This Commentary from NEPC Director Kevin Welner is a version of a piece that was published as part of series called “America the Fixable” at the Atlantic.com.  The edits made for the Atlantic.com version change the framing (no cupcakes!) and remove most of the links to research.

Unedited Atlantic.com Commentary from Kevin WelnerDownload

This Week's Education Research Report 4-28

Education Research Report:

This Week's Education Research Report 4-28

Automated Essay Scoring Systems as Effective as Human Graders

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 22 hours ago

A direct comparison between human graders and software designed to score student essays achieved virtually identical levels of accuracy, with the software in some cases proving to be more reliable, a groundbreaking studyhas found. “The demonstration showed conclusively that automated essay scoring systems are fast, accurate, and cost effective,” said Tom Vander Ark, CEO of Open Education Solutions, which provides consulting serves related to digital learning, and co-director of the study. That’s important because writing essays are one important way for students to learn critical ... more »

Meeting Oregon’s New High School Math Graduation Requirements

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 1 day ago

This study was motivated by a 2005 Oregon law that requires students to take three years of mathematics courses at the algebra I level or above (advanced math), beginning with the Class of 2014. The study examines the percentage of Oregon students enrolled in high school–level math courses during 2006/07 and 2007/08 who would have been on track to graduate had the new mathematics requirements been in place. It also examines whether there would have been an adequate supply of teachers endorsed to teach advanced math in 2006/07 and 2007/08, had the new requirements been in place.

How California evaluates teachers and principals

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 1 day ago

How California's local education agencies evaluate teachers and principals,summarizes the results of a statewide survey of teacher and principal evaluation practices across school districts and direct-funded charter schools in California. Key findings include: * Sixty-one percent of responding local education agencies indicated that their teacher evaluation systems are based on the California Standards for the Teaching Profession. * For teacher evaluation, 57 percent of respondents reported using student achievement outcomes or growth data as partial or primary evidence. For princ... more »

Lasting Impacts of Effective Teachers

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 1 day ago

*Teachers who raise test scores have long-term effects on students’ college enrollment and earnings as adults* A study showing the large impacts that highly skilled teachers have on students’ academic achievement and lifetime earnings is available on the Education Next website, www.educationnext.org. Researchers Raj Chetty and John N. Friedman of Harvard University and Jonah E. Rockoff of Columbia University analyzed school-district data from grades 3–8 for 2.5 million children, and linked those data to information on student outcomes as young adults. Their study has received wid... more »

Number Line Is Learned, Not Innate Human Intuition

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 2 days ago

Tape measures. Rulers. Graphs. The gas gauge in your car, and the icon on your favorite digital device showing battery power. The number line and its cousins -- notations that map numbers onto space and often represent magnitude -- are everywhere. Most adults in industrialized societies are so fluent at using the concept, we hardly think about it. We don't stop to wonder: Is it "natural"? Is it cultural? Now, challenging a mainstream scholarly position that the number-line concept is innate, a study suggests it is learned. The study, published in PLoS ONE April 25, is based on e... more »

Using the Freshman On-Track Indicator to Predict Graduation

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 2 days ago

This report examines how well the freshman on-track indicator developed by the Consortium on Chicago School Research predicts on-time graduation in two urban districts in the Midwest Region. This indicator classifies students at the end of the first year of high school as on-track or off-track to graduate based on grade 9 course credits earned and failures. REL Midwest examined on-track and off-track rates and for recent freshman cohorts as well as 4-year graduation rates for on-track and off-track students. Key findings include: * For both districts, students who were on trac... more »

Performance on Science Tests in Minnesota

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 2 days ago

This report examines how grade 5 and grade 8 student achievement on the 2009/10 MCA–II science assessment differed by student and school characteristics (gender, eligibility for free or reduced-price lunch, special education status, race/ethnicity, and prior-year academic achievement). The study found that most of the variation in scores was associated with demographic differences among students rather than with differences between schools. Key findings include: * Student achievement on the MCA–II science assessment differed across demographic subgroups, favoring male students,... more »

School climate can affect overweight children for life

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 3 days ago

Ω Kids can be really mean – especially to other kids – and school-yard bullying can have serious immediate and long-term effects. One area of increasing concern in this regard is the possibility that overweight or obese children shoulder the brunt of bullying. With childhood obesity rates reaching unprecedented levels, this may translate into even more negative behavior being experienced by today's kids. It is also possible that children who are disliked by their peers may respond by becoming less active and more likely to overeat – compounding the issue even further. It's a vicio... more »

Achievement Among English Language Learner Students in New Jersey

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 3 days ago

Ω This report describes enrollment and achievement trends of LEP students in New Jersey public schools between 2002/03 and 2008/09. It documents achievement gaps between LEP and general education students in language arts literacy and math, as measured by statewide assessments administered in grades 3, 4, 8, and 11. The study's main findings include: * LEP students in New Jersey spoke 187 languages in 2008/09, up from 151 in 2002/03. In 2008/09, Spanish (spoken by 66.8 percent of LEP students in the state) had the most speakers, followed by Arabic (2.6 percent), Korean (2.5 perce... more »

Milieu teaching was found to have no discernible effects on communication/language competencies for preschool children with disabilities

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 3 days ago

Ω WWC Full Report Milieu teaching is a practice that involves manipulating or arranging stimuli in a preschool child’s natural environment to create a setting that encourages them to engage in a targeted behavior. For example, a teacher might place a desirable toy in a setting to encourage a student to request that toy (where requesting a toy is the desired target behavior). Typically, milieu teaching involves four strategies that a teacher will utilize to encourage a student to demonstrate a target behavior: modeling, mand-modeling, incidental teaching, and time-delay. Through ad... more »

Reading, Mathematics, and Science Achievement of Language-Minority Students In Grade 8

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 3 days ago

Ω Students who entered kindergarten as proficient in English, regardless of their home language, scored higher on the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 1998–99 (ECLS-K) eighth-grade reading, math, and science assessments than language minority students who became proficient in English after starting kindergarten. This is one finding of the analyses reported in Reading, Mathematics, and Science Achievement of Language-Minority Students In Grade 8, an Issue Brief released today by the National Center for Education Statistics. The ECLS-K tracked the education...more »

Delaware: Achievement of English Language Learner Students

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 3 days ago

Ω The number of English language learner (ELL) students in Delaware public schools rose 91.7 percent from 2002/03 to 2008/09, whereas total enrollment increased 7.7 percent. ELL student enrollment increased from 3.0 percent of total student enrollment in 2002/03 to 5.4 percent in 2008/09. These figures are of concern to educators because of the large achievement gaps nationally between ELL and non-ELL students and the need to meet the No Child Left Behind Act goal of bringing all students to proficiency by 2014. This report describes enrollment and achievement trends between 2002/... more »

Changes in Student Populations and Teacher Workforce in Low-Performing Chicago Schools Targeted for Reform

Jonathan Kantrowitz at Education Research Report - 3 days ago

This report examines changes in student populations and teacher workforce in 31 chronically low-performing Chicago public schools. These schools were selected for district-led reform interventions following five distinct types of reform models.