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Is The Teaching Profession so Black & White?
Teacher Assessments?
| “ I thought I was a good teacher and could not understand what was happening ” |
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Schools join in
But it is not just the newspaper that is now making use of the data. Although LAUSD was initially reluctant to put the data in the public domain, it has - perhaps surprisingly - now decided to put together its own value-added scores.
After first publishing value-added data - dubbed Academic Growth over Time (AGT) - at a school level, it started a pilot scheme on individual teachers. Crucially, the teacher-level ratings are not made public, but many - no doubt scarred by their experiences with the Los Angeles Times - are still less than impressed.
According to the AGT system, Brent Smiley, who teaches social sciences at Lawrence Middle School in Chatsworth, near LA, freely admits that he is “one of the ‘least effective’ teachers in the district”.
When I ask him why, he pauses for dramatic effect. “No matter what I do,” he finally answers, “I can’t get 103 per cent of my kids over the bar.” He bursts out laughing.
Smiley’s problem, he explains, is that the pupils at his school are too good. “The kids I teach are gifted and highly gifted, the school’s a magnet for them. And so last year I had 97.7 per cent of my students reach advanced or proficient. I was only able to go up about 1.5 per cent (from the year before).”
Compared with the set goal of a 6 percentage point increase, Smiley had - through no fault of his own - fallen short.
The relative nature of the accountability system has created perverse incentives for teachers, Smiley explains. “I would be best served personally to have my students tank the testing every other year. That would mean that one year I’d be the ‘most effective’, the next year I’d be the ‘least effective’, and I’d get ping-pong balled. That is not healthy for anyone, that’s not what I’m doing. I don’t care a damn about my test scores (but) I owe it to the kids to get them to be as proficient as possible.”
So how does Smiley play the system to achieve such good scores for his pupils? “I’ve figured out how to beat the test,” he admits. “It’s just a vocab test they take through social studies, that’s all it is. It’s a piece of cake. We spent five minutes a week on it, and we hit 97.7 per cent.”
But the irony for Smiley is that, having learned how to game the system, he can teach the way he wants to. “By figuring out how to beat their test, it freed me up to go about teaching the right way. But not everyone has the luxury of kids who are at the upper echelon.”
By trying to create a new accountability system that aims to ensure that teachers are teaching well, some teachers are paradoxically having to focus on getting a good score, rather than on providing a good, rounded education for their pupils.
But it is not just the newspaper that is now making use of the data. Although LAUSD was initially reluctant to put the data in the public domain, it has - perhaps surprisingly - now decided to put together its own value-added scores.
After first publishing value-added data - dubbed Academic Growth over Time (AGT) - at a school level, it started a pilot scheme on individual teachers. Crucially, the teacher-level ratings are not made public, but many - no doubt scarred by their experiences with the Los Angeles Times - are still less than impressed.
According to the AGT system, Brent Smiley, who teaches social sciences at Lawrence Middle School in Chatsworth, near LA, freely admits that he is “one of the ‘least effective’ teachers in the district”.
When I ask him why, he pauses for dramatic effect. “No matter what I do,” he finally answers, “I can’t get 103 per cent of my kids over the bar.” He bursts out laughing.
Smiley’s problem, he explains, is that the pupils at his school are too good. “The kids I teach are gifted and highly gifted, the school’s a magnet for them. And so last year I had 97.7 per cent of my students reach advanced or proficient. I was only able to go up about 1.5 per cent (from the year before).”
Compared with the set goal of a 6 percentage point increase, Smiley had - through no fault of his own - fallen short.
The relative nature of the accountability system has created perverse incentives for teachers, Smiley explains. “I would be best served personally to have my students tank the testing every other year. That would mean that one year I’d be the ‘most effective’, the next year I’d be the ‘least effective’, and I’d get ping-pong balled. That is not healthy for anyone, that’s not what I’m doing. I don’t care a damn about my test scores (but) I owe it to the kids to get them to be as proficient as possible.”
So how does Smiley play the system to achieve such good scores for his pupils? “I’ve figured out how to beat the test,” he admits. “It’s just a vocab test they take through social studies, that’s all it is. It’s a piece of cake. We spent five minutes a week on it, and we hit 97.7 per cent.”
But the irony for Smiley is that, having learned how to game the system, he can teach the way he wants to. “By figuring out how to beat their test, it freed me up to go about teaching the right way. But not everyone has the luxury of kids who are at the upper echelon.”
By trying to create a new accountability system that aims to ensure that teachers are teaching well, some teachers are paradoxically having to focus on getting a good score, rather than on providing a good, rounded education for their pupils.