Supporting Effective Teaching in Tennessee: Executive Summary | Page 28

school year. By contrast, research has found the professional
development opportunities most likely to improve teacher
effectiveness are “characterized by sustained, coherent study;
collaborative learning; time for classroom experimentation;
and follow-up.” 44
Professional development goes hand-in-hand with teacher
evaluations, as evaluations provide a mechanism for teachers
to reflect on the skills and content areas they need to further
develop. Recent research has found that even when teacher
evaluations occur, they are rarely used effectively, as almost all
teachers receive the top rating on every aspect of their evaluation
and principals rarely take time to talk with teachers about their
evaluations. Moreover, very few evaluations explicitly include a
discussion of student achievement gains.45
Tennessee’s statewide teacher evaluation process is called the
Framework for Evaluation and Professional Growth. Created in
1997, the framework was revised in 2004 to increase its specificity
and bring it into alignment with the “ highly qualified” teacher
provision of the No Child Left Behind Act. All classroom and
specialist teachers, including media specialists, counselors, and
psychologists, must be evaluated using the framework. While a
teacher with an apprentice license must be evaluated every year, a
teacher with a professional license must be evaluated at least once
every five years. Apprentice teachers in their first two years must
be observed by their principal three times, apprentice teachers
in their third year must be observed two times, and professional
teachers must be observed twice or undergo a focused assessment.
Teachers must be notified before classroom observations are
conducted. Evaluations are supposed to be used to create
professional growth plans for teachers, which are intended to
structure teachers’ professional development opportunities.
In 2006, the State Board of Education and the state Department
of Education commissioned a review of the framework. The
review found that over 30 percent of respondents had received
less than a half day of training on the framework, teachers
generally did not know the criteria that were examined on
the framework, and the domain of the framework focused on
professional development was confusing to both administrators
and teachers.46 On the whole, this suggests the evaluation
framework is not being used particularly effectively. At least
partly for these reasons, the Governor’s office recently launched a
task force to examine how the framework might be improved.
The Tennessee Department of Education provides a variety of
professional development opportunities for teachers, including
a number of statewide and regional conferences. The most
recent addition to the Department’s professional development

offering is the Electronic Learning Center (ELC), an online
set of resources including podcasts, video clips, and webbased professional development seminars. The ELC, which
was accessed by over 154,000 in the first six months of 2009,
includes video recordings of the Department’s Spring Content
Knowledge Institute and the Department’s “Every Student A
Reader” instructional summit.47 While the state is working hard
to provide appropriate professional development opportunities
for teachers, it is very difficult for teachers to align their
professional development opportunities with their individual
needs if they are not receiving effective evaluations.
Also, unlike a number of other states, Tennessee has not
broadly encouraged or incentivized the implementation of
induction and mentoring programs for new teachers or the
development of small, collaborative learning communities in
individual schools. However, some districts have adopted or
developed such programs, including the Benwood Initiative
in Hamilton County and the Teacher Advancement Program
in Knox County, both of which are highlighted as promising
practices on page 47 of this report.

Tenure and Compensation
Many of the most critical policies that directly affect teachers in
Tennessee are based on qualities other than teacher effectiveness.
Foremost among these policies are tenure and compensation.
Tennessee teachers are eligible for tenure after a three-year
probationary period, the same period of time required for
tenure in 31 other states. At the end of this probationary period,
the director of schools can either recommend the teacher for
tenure or deny renewal of the teacher’s contract. If tenure is
granted, a teacher cannot be removed from that district in the
future without due process, with dismissal requiring evidence
of “incompetency, inefficiency, neglect of duty, unprofessional
conduct, or insubordination.” In practice, it is extremely rare
for a tenured teacher to be fired. Other states have reformed
their tenure laws in recent years by extending the probation
period before a teacher can obtain tenure, requiring teachers to
renew their tenure status on a regular basis, and strengthening
teacher evaluation processes.48
In terms of compensation, Tennessee’s average teacher salary
ranks 40th in the nation (see detailed discussion on pages 20-21).
The state teachers’ salary scale, which serves as a minimum for
all districts across the state, is based solely on a teacher’s years
of experience and level of education, with more experienced
teachers and teachers with higher levels of education receiving
additional compensation.

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