Both a value-added method and principals’ observations tied to a teaching framework identified the same teachers as particularly high- or low-performing under Chicago’s teacher-evaluation pilot, a study has found.
But principals struggled to provide high-quality “coaching” and support to teachers based on the results, says the report from the Consortium for Chicago School Research.
The study is the second-year analysis of Chicago’s pilot teacher-evaluation system. It looks at the performance of teachers in selected elementary schools in which the system was piloted from 2008-09 to 2009-10.
The authors compared ratings given by principals with those of external evaluators. They also analyzed the relationship between principals’ observations and value-added estimates for the teachers, where available. Value-added estimates use test scores to measure how much growth an average student makes in a year and then compare that to students’ actual performance. Case studies were also conducted in eight of the pilot schools.
