(THEC) has published an annual Report Card on the Effectiveness of Teacher Training Programs. This report card includes
data on program completers’ performance on Praxis exams,
Tennessee Value-Added Assessment System (TVAAS) data,
and teacher placement and retention rates.76 Since the initial
publication of the report, THEC has worked with teacher training programs, the State Board of Education, the Tennessee
Department of Education, and other stakeholders to redesign
and improve the report. Based on feedback gathered during
these discussions, THEC plans to include data from the Tennessee Educator Acceleration Model (TEAM) and other alternative teacher evaluation models in future report cards.77 These
annual report cards have the potential to inform prospective
teachers’ decisions about where to pursue a degree in education, hiring decisions made at the district and school levels,
improvement practices in teacher preparation programs, and
policy shifts in teacher preparation at the state level.
Teacher Evaluation:
In addition to improving the quality of
teacher preparation programs, it is critical to provide current
teachers with the feedback and support they need to continually improve their instruction. With the passage of the First
to the Top Act in 2010, a new teacher evaluation system was
put in place.78 This teacher evaluation system was implemented for the first time in the 2011-12 school year and required teachers to have annual performance evaluations that
incorporated measures of student learning. The Tennessee
Consortium on Research, Evaluation, and Development’s (TNCRED) First to the Top survey found that Tennessee teachers
have developed a more favorable view of the teacher evaluation since it was first implemented. For example, the percentage of teachers who felt the teacher evaluation would improve
their teaching grew from 38 percent in 2012 to 53 percent in
2014. Additionally, the percentage of teachers who said feedback from the teacher evaluation system is more focused on
judgment than on improving teaching decreased from 27 percent in 2012, to 19 percent in 2014.79
Teachers who participated in SCORE’s 2014 Listening Tour reported similar feedback on the evaluation after three years of
implementation, noting that the teacher evaluation promotes
more meaningful conversations between teachers and principals.80 The teacher evaluation system also provides more
in-depth and comprehensive information to teachers, principals, district leaders, and policymakers than was previously
available, ensuring that decisions ranging from professional learning opportunities to teacher placement can be made
with a more robust set of data.
The classroom observation component of the teacher evaluation has elevated principals’ role as an instructional leader
in their school. Even so, on SCORE’s 2014 Listening Tour, some
principals and evaluators noted challenges faced in the implementation of the classroom observation.81 Centers of Regional
Excellence (CORE) offered additional support to schools on the
classroom observation by placing TEAM coaches in schools
to train and support evaluators. TEAM coaches worked alongside administrators in these schools, serving as co-observers
to ensure evaluators established a deep understanding of the
classroom observation rubric. The Tennessee Department of
Education found this strategy effectively improved agreement
between different evaluators. For this reason, CORE offices will
continue to offer schools the support of TEAM coaches in the
2014-15 school year. In addition to school-level supports,
TEAM coaches provided district-level and regional support on
the implementation of the teacher evaluation.
TVAAS and the Teacher Evaluation: A foundational component of the Tennessee teacher evaluation is the Tennessee
Value-Added Assessment System (TVAAS). While other measures of student outcomes included in the teacher evaluation focus on student achievement, TVAAS instead focuses
on the amount of growth students make during the school
year. Diverse stakeholders such as district leaders, school
leaders, and teachers, have voiced concerns related to the
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