Strengthening Teacher and Principal Performance: New Guide Offers Best Practices to States and Districts
05 März 2012 - 3:00PM
Business Wire
Improving educator effectiveness is a large component of every
current, major state and federal education initiative. In fact, the
Education Commission of the States reports that 19 states have
revamped their teacher evaluation systems in the past year--and
many others are currently debating changes. These changes are also
the result of federal programs, such as Race to the Top, the
reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, and
the Teacher Incentive Fund grants.
To assist states and school districts as they undertake the
critical task of developing and launching next-generation educator
effectiveness systems, Pearson today unveiled a new guide,
"Evaluating Teachers and Principals: Developing Fair, Valid, and
Reliable Systems."
This guide aims to help policymakers, state board members,
school district leaders, and other stakeholders as they design
educator effectiveness systems that are fair, valid, and legally
defensible.
"Moving to new ways of thinking about teacher evaluation and
career development for educators requires transforming the cultures
of schools and districts around the country. For this to
occur, stakeholders at all levels, from parents to
representatives of teachers to governmental officials, must be a
part of the discussion,” said Cynthia G. Brown, Vice President for
Education Policy at the Center for American
Progress. “Pearson's new guide is intended to help build
successful educator effectiveness systems and serve as a platform
to foster a healthy national dialogue about the process, its
challenges, and opportunities."
Pearson's guide walks education leaders through numerous steps
necessary to engage stakeholders effectively and build a strong
policy framework for educator effectiveness systems. Steps
include:
- Defining the construct for what
constitutes an effective educator
- Deploying multiple indicators to reveal
evidence that characterizes good teaching and school
leadership
- Building strong data analysis and
reporting tools to reveal useful information about students,
educators, and schools, including how they perform and how they can
continually improve through targeted feedback and ongoing
professional development
"Next-generation educator effectiveness systems need to be
designed so they fairly evaluate educators, continually build
educator capacity, provide ongoing career development and,
ultimately, improve learning outcomes for all students," said Kelly
Burling, Ph.D., Director of Pearson’s Center for Educator
Effectiveness. "A key goal of our new guide is to help leaders
establish reasonable parameters for educator effectiveness systems,
and then engage stakeholders in the development and implementation
of their key features. The guide can help leaders position their
initiatives in a manner that illuminates the value of educator
effectiveness systems to a variety of audiences."
Developing fair and valid educator effectiveness systems is a
focus of Pearson's research and development agenda, which builds on
years of experience working with states and national organizations,
such as the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards
(NBPTS) to develop, deliver and score pre- and in-service educator
assessments, teacher and leader rubrics, and evaluator training
protocols.
"As states and school districts transition to new educator
effectiveness systems, Pearson stands ready to share our technical
expertise and to help policymakers and practitioners learn from
each other," continued Dr. Burling. “We’re working with research
and business partners to create resources such as this guide, as
well as additional research papers on timely topics, a publicly
accessible web portal, regional workshops, and webinars, to give
states and districts the resources they need to establish quality
evaluation systems."
In addition, Pearson invites education leaders to share their
insights on the content of the guide as well as perspectives on the
components of a successful educator effectiveness system at
http://educatoreffectiveness.pearsonassessments.com/guide.
"By sharing experiences in this open online environment, states
and school districts will learn from one another as we all work
together to launch the next generation of educator effectiveness
systems," said Dr. Burling.
This new guide as well as other tools and resources for
improving educator effectiveness, including information about a
workshop on the new guide slated for this spring in Washington,
D.C., will be available on Pearson's Educator Effectiveness website
at http://educatoreffectiveness.pearsonassessments.com or by
contacting Abigail Rogers at abigail.rogers@pearson.com.
About Pearson
Pearson (NYSE:PSO), the global leader in education services,
education technology and school solutions, provides innovative
print and digital education materials for preK through college,
student information systems and learning management systems,
teacher professional development, career certification programs,
and testing and assessment products that set the standard for the
industry. Pearson’s other primary businesses include the Financial
Times Group and the Penguin Group. For more information, go to
www.pearsoned.com or www.pearsonassessments.com.
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