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The Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education

Educator Evaluation: Action Plan to Revise Regulations on Student Impact Rating

To:
Members of the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education
From:
Mitchell D. Chester, Ed.D., Commissioner
Date:
September 16, 2016

In June 2011, the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (Board) adopted new regulations for the evaluation of all Massachusetts educators. The regulations, which apply to both administrators and teachers throughout the state, are designed to:

At the time, I noted that the effort to implement the new system would take several years since the changes outlined in the new regulations were not simply technical - they represented a culture shift for most school districts.

We are now five years into the process, and we have learned a great deal. As the Board knows, in our Educator Evaluation Framework, teachers and administrators receive two separate ratings: (1) a summative rating; and (2) a student impact rating. The regulations provided for staggered implementation, with districts adopting the process for determining a summative rating first, and subsequently adopting the process for determining the student impact rating.

Over the last few years, districts have successfully implemented the process for determining the summative rating. Implementing the process for determining an educator's student impact rating has been more challenging. As described in more detail below, the Department is discussing with stakeholders possible amendments to the regulations that would address concerns about the student impact rating. It is my intention to bring to the Board in October proposed amendments to the Educator Evaluation regulations that address those concerns.

Background

Beginning with the development of the evaluation framework, and at each stage of the implementation of the Educator Evaluation regulations, the Department has engaged with stakeholders. Most recently, throughout 2015-2016, the Commissioner and Department staff met regularly with a number of advisory committees established by the Department, including: the Superintendent Advisory Cabinet, the Principal Advisory Cabinet and the Teacher Advisory Cabinet, as well as the Working Group on Evaluating Educator Impact, which met from January through June 2016. Department staff and I have met regularly with the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents (M.A.S.S.), including staff and officers to solicit feedback. In May and June, the Board heard from K-12 practitioners, state and national policymakers, union leaders, and researchers on the implementation of the Educator Evaluation Framework.

We have heard concerns about assigning individual educators a student impact rating. We have also heard from stakeholders that evidence of student learning, either from common assessments or statewide assessments, is already an important component of the summative performance rating. For example:

These stakeholder comments all point to a solution to the concerns of implementation: eliminate the separate student impact rating from the Framework while continuing to use evidence from common assessments in order to provide educators with feedback on the extent to which they are promoting student learning and achievement as well as to incorporate this evidence into each educator's rating.

Moving Forward

The Department is discussing with stakeholders (including M.A.S.S., MTA and AFT-MA) possible changes to the regulations to address the concerns they have raised - specifically eliminating the separate student impact rating and instead including student learning within one or more of the standards of practice.

Our goal is to support meaningful educator evaluation while maintaining student learning as a central consideration. The constructive ideas we have heard have been helpful, and I expect to present proposed amendments to the educator evaluation regulations to the Board in October.