The northeast may be paralyzed by a snow storm today, but teacher evaluation news goes on. ?
Indeed, we learn from the New York Times' Sharon Otterman (electronic version; the print version didn't arrive!) that Gotham's teacher-rating system has a few glitches:
For the past three years, Katie Ward and Melanie McIver have worked as a team at Public School 321 in Park Slope, Brooklyn, teaching a fourth-grade class. But on the reports that rank the city's teachers based on their students' standardized test scores, Ms. Ward's name is nowhere to be found.
No doubt teacher unions all over the country are saying ?we told you so.? The ratings in New York City, according to Otterman, ?are based on an algorithm that few other than statisticians can understand, and on tests that the state has said were too narrow and predictable.?
This, of course, complicates one of the key attributes of the Race to the Top, which promoted value-added teacher rankings in its awards competition. Not only did New York state change its laws to help win a RTTT award, but NYC is promoting release of value-added data to news organizations (a case still before the court?see here and here).
Snowed in or not,?you?should give?Otterman's piece?a read.
?Peter Meyer, Bernard Lee Schwartz Policy Fellow
