Over at the National Journal’s group edu-bigwig blog, they’re debating the question “Are the Race To the Top Requirements Fair?” A lot of the discussion centers on the RTT requirement that states eliminate prohibitions against linking student test score data with individual teachers. Most of the bloggers are in favor of this, on the grounds that outlawing the use of information about how much students learn in evaluating the extent to which teachers help students learn is insane. But National Education Association president Dennis Van Roekel disagrees, writing:
We’re concerned about the effectiveness and reliability of requiring states to link data on student achievement to individual teachers for the purpose of teacher and principal evaluation. Teachers who work with disadvantaged students shouldn’t be “evaluated” based on whether their students hit a particular test target on a particular timeline. And we certainly shouldn’t base additional compensation on whether students meet particular testing targets on a particular day. We need to offer incentives so that our best teachers teach the students most in need of assistance, not incentives to teach students most likely to score highest on a standardized test. As with NCLB, good intentions can lead to unintended—and unacceptable—consequences.
An interesting sort of political science question is just how long the NEA can get away with vague and disingenuous comments like this. Nobody–nobody–wants to judge teachers based purely on the percentage of students who meet a given cut score on a test at the end of the year. That would be crazy. All reasonable conversations about the use of end-of-the-year student test score data for teacher evaluations begin with the assumption that we should (A) account for where students were at the beginning of the year and/or take into account other data about their academic histories, and (B) not rely exclusively on test-score data. Van Roekel knows this. Everybody knows this. The people pushing for the student data-teacher linkages are the same people who want to get more high-quality teachers in the classrooms of disadvantaged students. They’re not idiots; of course they don’t want to create an unfair evaluation system that would directly counter that goal. But conceding that makes the whole thing seem a lot more rational and then where would the NEA be?
Also, it’s easy enough to raise the specter of measurement error by talking about “particular testing targets on a particular day.” But that requires a level of seriousness and empiricism about how the numbers tend to play out. Measurement error is real and significant but also finite and measurable and thus subject to sensible decision-making and interpretation. If a given teacher’s students all consistently fail to meet a particular target on a particular day, year after year, even though most of them were hitting targets in previous years–hey, that might mean something! But acknowledging that would take the conversation to a place the NEA clearly doesn’t want to go.
Chad Aldeman 
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Only the most willful of the teacher-bashers will simply link test scores with evlauation, but there are plenty of them around. And Kevin enthusiatically supports some of them.
Yes, making VAM "work" is more complex but it is the same concept. Just as it as absurd to evaluate all teachers regardless of student background on a test score snapshot, it is equally absurd to evaluate diverse teachers on a snapshot of "growth."
Use growth models for the purposes that they were designed and we can get constructive data-informed collaboration. Encourage misuse of VAM for evaluation and you will get the unintended disaster described by Van Rockel and the other commenters.
I know we are asking noneducators like Kevin to look at the world through our eyes and see through some nuance, but we need to find a way so "refomers" understand that Kevin is offering a distinction without a difference.
Just as students come to schools with differing backgrounds and come to classes with differing levels of skills, they grow at different rates. How do you think the gaps got their in the first place? Had the poorest and most traumatized been increasing their knowledge for their entire lives at the same rate, the gaps wouldn't exist.
Kevin is just using some fancy words to get arouund his logic. He wants to end achievement gaps by fiat. He orders us teachers to end inequality in America, and if we don't do it single-handingly, then we are blameworthy and "reformers" should use whatever tools that are available to destroy us. As that happens, he'll replace the "status quo" with ...
Making this kind of thing (e.g. value added measurements of teachers) work is a very technical matter, and some people steadfastly refuse to look at the technical obstacles. What should call them?
I actually, by virtue of my own insanity, volunteer to teach ESL kids to pass the English Regents exam, a test that's totally inappropriate for them. No one really wants to do stuff like this, and I could certainly serve them better by teaching them how to speak and use English.
But they can't graduate unless they pass this test, someone has to do this job, so I do it. I could teach what I'm supposed to, ESL, and avoid standardized test scores entirely. I may indeed do that one day if enough pressure is put to bear on me. Who wants this hassle? No one, and most teachers, by virtue of teaching courses that don't include standardized testing, don't have it.
I'm sorry, but there is enormous pressure to pass as many people as possible where I am, in the biggest public school district in the country. It's been in the papers.