Studer Community Institute

Education funding must be tied to value added by schools, teachers

March 30, 2015
/ Rick Harper
/ education

What really matters about school is how much value a student gets out of the course of study. But measuring the learning that is attributable to school versus other things, like growing up in a household that values reading and education, is tough. A child who shows up for kindergarten ready for school will test better on day one, and likely on day 180 as well, than a student who begins school ill-prepared. This means that when we test students and assign grades to them and to our schools, we are capturing a lot more than just the value that is added by the hard-working faculty and staff of that school. A performance evaluation system that rewards educators for adding value to student’s lives is focused on the right thing. Florida public schools started down the value-added path in 2011 when the legislature began requiring the use of student achievement test data when evaluating the performance of teachers. The American Institutes for Research studied how best to estimate teacher contributions to student learning. The AIR studies describe the reasons that it is a complex problem to separate out just how much a higher test scores is caused by skilled teachers versus by other factors beyond the teacher’s control. Value added is the right thing to measure, but it can be tough to ascertain accurately. It turns out that students may do better when they are in classes with other well-performing students. Good teachers may seek assignments in schools where other good teachers work. While statisticians would like to have measurements taken from situations where both students and teachers are randomly assigned to schools and classes, this isn’t the way it works in real life. When things that are important drivers of student learning outcomes vary across classes, teachers and schools, those drivers must be accounted for correctly. If they aren’t, then blame for bad outcomes may be given when none is due, and similarly for credit for good teaching. The AIR modeling of FCAT gains for Florida used things such as prior years achievement score, gifted status, attendance, moves from one school to another, class size and the academic similarity of kids in the class. Both the AIR research and a large and growing body of academic literature suggest that value added can be measured. It can even be measured in the messy world of real life, where both teachers and students tend to sort themselves into clusters in ways that complicate accurate assessment. The bottom line is that linking teacher evaluation to improved student performance is the right thing to do. At all levels of education, from young children to university, effective teaching and engagement make a positive difference. That difference is very important for the future quality of life of those students. But the problem is that good and valid measures are tough to construct and implement. We should continue to insist on performance incentives for at least some share of funding for teachers and schools. We should continue to improve the quality of the data and the analysis that goes into those evaluations. Dr. Rick Harper serves as director of the Studer Community Institute, a Pensacola, Florida-based organization that seeks citizen-powered solutions to challenges the community faces. He also directs the University of West Florida’s Office of Economic Development and Engagement in Pensacola.

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Education funding must be tied to value added by schools, teachers

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