H. Alix Gallagher

Vaughn Elementary's Innovative Teacher Evaluation System: Are Teacher Evaluation Scores Related to Growth in Student Achievement?

In this study, I examined the validity of a performance-based, subject-specific teacher evaluation system by analyzing the relationship between teacher evaluation scores and student achievement. From a policy perspective, establishing validity was important because it is embedded in a knowledge-and skills-based pay system, which attached high stakes to evaluation scores. In the first stage of the study, I used hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) to estimate value-added teacher effects, which were then correlated with teacher evaluation scores in literacy, mathematics, language arts, and a composite measure of student achievement. Additionally, teacher evaluation scores were inserted into the HLM models as subject-specific predictors of student achievement. Results indicate a strong, positive, and statistically significant relationship between teacher evaluation scores and student achievement in reading and a composite measure of teacher and student performance and a positive, although not statistically significant, relationship in mathematics. In the second stage of the study, I used document analyses and interviews with teachers to explore factors affecting the relationship between teacher evaluation scores and student achievement across subjects. Findings suggest that the relationship is stronger in reading than mathematics because both teachers and evaluators have more pedagogical knowledge and better alignment to standards and assessments in reading than in math.

Using Social Network Analysis to Study How Collegial Interactions Can Augment Teacher Learning from External Professional Development.

This article presents an analysis showing how collegial interactions can augment the mechanism of teachers’ learning from professional development. The analysis relies on social network data and self-reports of writing instructional practices from teachers in 20 different schools that were part of a longitudinal study of the National Writing Project’s partnership activities. The results indicate that both organized professional development and interactions with colleagues who gained instructional expertise from participating in prior professional development were associated with the extent to which teachers changed their writing processes instruction. Furthermore, the effects of professional development varied by teachers’ baseline practices. The study illustrates the potential for using data on teachers’ social networks to investigate indirect effects of professional development and the variation in professional development effects associated with different initial levels of expertise.

Shaping Professional Development to Promote the Diffusion of Instructional Expertise among Teachers.

This study examines how high-quality professional development can promote the diffusion of effective teaching strategies among teachers through collaboration. Drawing on longitudinal and sociometric data from a study of writing professional development in 39 schools, this study shows that teachers’ participation in professional development is associated with providing more help to colleagues on instructional matters. Further, the influence of professional development on participants’ instructional practice diffuses through the network of helping. These findings suggest that in addition to direct effects, spillover effects of professional development can occur through collegial interactions. Evidence presented in this study potentially helps educational leaders develop high-quality professional development programs and distribute professional development participants within schools to enhance all teachers’ instructional practices.

Impact of the National Writing Project's College-Ready Writers Program in High-Need Rural Districts

ABSTRACT By 2013, all 50 states and the District of Columbia had adopted college- and career-ready standards in English language arts and mathematics, placing a greater emphasis on argument writing to prepare students for life after high school. Solving the specific problem of how to help teachers teach to new standards for argument writing as well as the broader problem of improving teaching and learning requires continued efforts to understand how to support teachers in making substantial changes in instruction. This paper reports on a district-randomized controlled trial of the National Writing Projects College-Ready Writers Program (CRWP), implemented in high-need rural districts in 10 states, testing one instance of professional development paired with supporting curricular resources and a formative assessment tool designed to shift instruction to align with the new college- and career-ready standards in English language arts classes in Grades 7–10. Researchers randomly assigned 44 rural districts either to receive two years of CRWP or to be in a business-as-usual control group and found positive impacts on teacher practice and student source-based argument writing.