In a recent opinion piece in Education Week, David Gamberg, superintendent of both the Southold Union Free School District and the Greenport Union Free School District, reflects on what makes a good school. Below are excerpts from his piece: Words matter. Of course, brick and mortar are only a small Read more
Observations of teacher performance are a critical component of most teacher evaluation systems, and, if done well, they can help teachers better understand and improve their practice. Yet, as critical as observations are to ensuring quality instruction, not much is known about how districts are training and supporting their observers. Read more
Deans for Impact recently looked at nearly two dozen educator preparation programs and found that only six have access to student achievement data connected to the teachers they prepared. Less than a third have access to other kinds of data about their graduates’ performance, like classroom observations. The organization, in Read more
The 2016 edition of Education Week’s Quality Counts report—Called to Account: New Directions in School Accountability—examines how new state and federal strategies are transforming the assessment of school performance and reshaping the consequences for poor results. In addition to the special focus on accountability, Quality Counts 2016 features the report’s Read more
In the last several years, state policymakers have enacted a dizzying array of new policies on education issues ranging from assessment and accountability to cursive-handwriting and citizenship exams. Within states, education policy-making isn’t led by one person or entity, but many — state legislatures, state education agencies, state and local Read more
The National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) recently released the 2015 report on State Teacher Policy. The report summarizes how the states are doing in developing policies that improve the teaching profession. The 2015 State Teacher Policy Yearbook provides a 360-degree analysis of every state law, rule, and regulation that Read more
The Gates Foundation and Rand Corporation have partnered to create a report focused on personalized learning approaches to education. This report, Continued Progress: Promising Evidence on Personalized Learning, examines achievement in 62 public charter and district schools that are pursuing a variety of personalized learning practices, and examines implementation details Read more
A recent survey and report conducted on the State of the State in Gifted Education by both the National Association for Gifted Children and the Council of State Directors of Programs for the Gifted released some surprising information on the (sometimes inadequate) plans, laws, and services in place for gifted Read more
New results from the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), or Nation’s Report Card, show a slowing or drop of both fourth-grade and eighth-grade students scores for 2015. This is the first recorded decline in scores since the assessment started being administered in 1990. The new results Read more
GTL Center’s latest Professional Learning Module is Supporting Principals Using Teacher Effectiveness Data (September 2015). It discusses practical strategies principals and district leaders can use to make hiring, staffing, teacher leadership, and professional development decisions. Teacher effectiveness data can help school and district leaders to make informed and evidence-based talent Read more
One of education’s big problems is that the collective wisdom, insights, observations and experience of educators are pretty much squandered. That is to say, millions of educators have figured out important things about what and how to teach under different kinds of conditions — but no system exists for them Read more
Three new toolkits from the Regional Education Laboratory (REL) Program are designed to help educators and leaders use data and evaluate programs and policies: Logic models for program design, implementation, and evaluation: Workshop toolkit This Logic Model Workshop Toolkit from REL Northeast & Islands helps state and district leaders design, Read more
Michael Lewis’ book, Moneyball, which later became a motion picture starring Brad Pitt, details the transformation of baseball’s Oakland A’s through data analytics. The true story makes a compelling case that making decisions based on data is both cost effective and powerful. In this month’s issue brief, we explore the Read more
Data Privacy? Get Schooled is an online course for policymakers and education professionals developed by the Data Quality Campaign (DQC) and the Foundation for Excellence in Education. It will discuss the value of education data, offer recommendations for addressing privacy concerns while promoting effective data use, and explore lessons learned Read more
A new article by Jason Tanz for Wired Magazine makes the argument that big data already reigns supreme, and for the most part helps us, in our lives, so why shouldn’t it do the same in education? Tanz understands that there are legitimate concerns from parents and education leaders about Read more
A new study shows that, despite the increased use of value-added data and other forms of teacher evaluation such as student or teacher surveys, first-hand principal observation of teachers remains the most trusted and used means by which decisions are made about teacher improvement. In other words, data are available, Read more