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What Value-Added Research Does And Does Not Show

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Worth reading in it's entirety.

For example, the most prominent conclusion of this body of evidence is that teachers are very important, that there’s a big difference between effective and ineffective teachers, and that whatever is responsible for all this variation is very difficult to measure (see here, here, here and here). These analyses use test scores not as judge and jury, but as a reasonable substitute for “real learning,” with which one might draw inferences about the overall distribution of “real teacher effects.”

And then there are all the peripheral contributions to understanding that this line of work has made, including (but not limited to):

Prior to the proliferation of growth models, most of these conclusions were already known to teachers and to education researchers, but research in this field has helped to validate and elaborate on them. That’s what good social science is supposed to do.

Conversely, however, what this body of research does not show is that it’s a good idea to use value-added and other growth model estimates as heavily-weighted components in teacher evaluations or other personnel-related systems. There is, to my knowledge, not a shred of evidence that doing so will improve either teaching or learning, and anyone who says otherwise is misinformed.*

As has been discussed before, there is a big difference between demonstrating that teachers matter overall – that their test-based effects vary widely, and in a manner that is not just random –and being able to accurately identify the “good” and “bad” performers at the level of individual teachers. Frankly, to whatever degree the value-added literature provides tentative guidance on how these estimates might be used productively in actual policies, it suggests that, in most states and districts, it is being done in a disturbingly ill-advised manner.

[readon2 url="http://shankerblog.org/?p=4358&mid=5417"]Read entire article[/readon2]

School related election issues today

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24 counties have issues on the ballot today, a majority of those issues are school related.

30 Tax levy questions (20 are school issues)
1 Combination question (This is a school bond issue with a tax levy question)
4 income tax questions (2 are school income tax questions)

We'll bring you the results tomorrow.

Shock Doctrine Summer

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As American public education arrives at the summer of its discontent, we have to contemplate how a system that has already had over 201,600 jobs wrung from its payrolls since August 2008 will handle the prospect of having to shed nearly a quarter of a million more jobs.

The litany of deep education cuts being forced on public schools is prompting many educators in cut-happy states like Texas , where the state legislature reduced per-student funding for the first time since World War II, to wonder if under-funding schools has become a "chronic" condition. School children in at least 21 states are looking at "identifiable, deep cuts in pre-kindergarten and/or K-12 spending," with states like Mississippi proposing school budgets that "fail to meet statutory requirements," and states like Florida enacting legislation that takes school spending back in time to 2005.

But it would be a mistake to assume that deep cuts in direct services to school kids mean that increases in education-related spending aren't occurring somewhere else. In fact, many of the very same governors behind draconian cuts to classrooms and schools also muscled through state houses new legislation to increase spending on new programs for charter schools and vouchers.

[readon2 url="http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2011062523/public-educations-shock-doctrine-summer-rolls-out"]Continue reading...[/readon2]

Budget merit pay - gone but not forgotten

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When the Ohio Senate's preferred version of the budget was released on Tuesday, it was quickly noted by many that the administration and House's policies to asses teacher compensation and employment, primarily on high stakes testing, had been removed. Legislators have been hearing from teachers and others how unworkable, unreliable, and unfair such a system would be. In light of the fact that many of these budget provisions mirrored those in SB5, it looked like a backdoor effort to circumvent the will of the voters. The elimination of these provisions was welcome news then.

But the budget process isn't over, and these provisions may yet return.

The Senate President held a press conference on the day of the budget release had had this to say on the issue

Senate President Tom Niehaus (R-New Richmond) said during a press conference, however, the performance pay provisions were removed from the budget because of confusion about how they related to collective bargaining legislation (SB 5) and the state's Race to the Top plan.
[..]
"We removed the provisions that were confusing some people that thought it was related to Senate Bill 5 and instead we're working on language to clarify that we want to make it consistent with what they're doing with Race to the Top," Sen. Niehaus said.

"So we want to support the statewide initiative that people have to put excellent teachers in the classroom, but we want to make sure we're not confusing them, that they think it has something to do with Senate Bill 5. They're two separate issues."
[…]
The Senate president said he expects to have some provision in the Senate version of the bill related to performance pay. "So we're having those conversations, but in order to get the conversation focused on the right area and that is this is about Race to the Top, we thought the easiest thing to do was take out the part that was confusing."

This didn't make a whole lot of sense to us. Ohio's RttT grant includes teacher evaluation provisions, which teachers agreed to - but furthermore - it relies upon collective bargaining to implement, the very method the legislature and administration continually seeks to eliminate. This ODE fact sheet lays out these issues succinctly.

FACT: Through RttT, districts may augment or otherwise revise compensation systems at the local level. Such changes must be made in collaboration with teachers and local unions.

The Senate President isn't the only actor in this play however, and today comes news that some of the other antagonists are not happy with these provisions being stripped out. The Speaker of the House and the Governor himself appear unhappy

Batchelder told reporters he was disappointed by the removal of those performance-pay provisions.

"My thought is that's crazy," the Republican leader said.
[...]
Senate Finance Chairman Chris Widener had said some senators were confused why the merit pay language was in the bill, and it was being further scrutinized.

The topic came up in a Wednesday meeting that Batchelder said he had with Republican Gov. John Kasich and Niehaus, R-New Richmond.

"The governor and I are in agreement and the Senate feels differently, so we'll just have to discuss it and work it out," Batchelder said.

The House leader said he thought it would go back into the bill.

We know the Governor is keen, and most likely receiving outside advice, to insert these cooperate education reforms in the budget. After all, he was successfully lobbied by Michele Rhee to place the same provisions in SB5. Furthermore, yesterday in testimony, and today in a Dispatch Op-Ed, Terry Ryan, Ohio VP of the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute, implored the Senate to put these corporate reform ideas back in. This despite his own Executive VP writing in the NYT recently that the use of high stakes testing for the purposes of teacher evaluations was like "attacking a fly with a sledgehammer. There’s already a ton of testing in our schools. Isn’t there another alternative?"

There is an alternative. It's called collective bargaining. Teachers have already agreed to innovative evaluation systems through the RttT application and in Cincinnati Public schools.

The budget simply isn't the place for such complex policy that requires study, broad consolation and agreement to be successfully implemented. And it certainly should not be done as a backdoor effort to circumvent voter efforts to repeal SB5.

We urge you to keep calling your state legislators and tell them that.

What's on your ballot?

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With the May 3rd primary election soon upon us, 148 school related issues will be decided by voters. The following comprise those issues:

The links take you to the local issues summaries as provided by the Ohio Secretary of State.

According to our friends at Support Ohio Schools

The school items are down from 178 in 2010 and 160 in 2009

The reduction is likely because districts are waiting to see how the final budget, due July 1, will affect funding and properly gauge the amount they should seek from voters.

"The significant decline in the number of levies being placed on the ballot due to uncertainty with the state budget is also a part of a multi-year trend toward fewer districts asking voters for additional funding," Support Ohio Schools Executive Director Jerry Rampelt said in a release.

"Unfortunately, we expect this trend to reverse quickly and significantly once schools realize the catastrophic funding realities that state budget cuts will bring."