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The National Center for Educational Accountability structures interviews with district administrators, principals, and teachers around a common framework.
| EVIDENCE OF STUDENT LEARNING | ||||||
| High-Quality Instruction | ||||||
| Themes | Curricu- lum and aca- demic goals | Staff selec- tion, leader- ship, and capa- city- building | Instruc- tional pro- grams, practices, and arrange- ments | Moni- toring: compil- ation, analysis, and use of data | Recog- nition, inter- vention, and adjust- ment |
Resource allocation
Core beliefs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Class- room | Ensure teaching content is based on specified academic objec- tives | Collab- orate in grade- level or subject teams focused on student work | Use evidence- based programs, practices, and arrange- ments | Monitor student learning | Re- cognize, inter- vene, or adjust based on student perfor- mance | |
| School | Center school plan on explicit improve- ment of specified academic objec- tives | Select, develop, and allocate staff based on student learning | Ensure the use of evidence- based programs, practices, and arrange- ments in every classroom | Monitor teacher perfor- mance and student learning | Re- cognize, inter- vene, or adjust based on teacher perfor- mance | |
| Dis- trict | Define clear and specific academic objec- tives by grade and subject | Provide strong leaders, highly qualified teachers, and aligned pro- fessional develop- ment | Provide evidence- based instruc- tional programs | Develop student- assess- ment and data- monitoring systems to monitor school perfor- mance | Re- cognize, inter- vene, or adjust based on school perfor- mance | |
| District’s clear and specific academic objectives | ||||||
| STATE STANDARDS | ||||||
| SOURCE: National Center for Educational Accountability | ||||||
Guaging High Performers
The National Center for Educational Accountability identifies high performers based on state test results over the latest three years and in multiple grades and subjects. The center uses a regression analysis to compare the performance of each school in a state with the average performance of schools with similar demographics in each grade and subject. Only those whose distance from the average consistently ranks them in the top tier—across multiple grades, subjects, and years—among schools with similar percentages of low-income students are identified for the best-practices research.
Starting in 2003-04, the center also required that such schools make adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
The NCEA and its affiliates also investigate a comparison group of average performers in participating states to see how they differ.