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Teacher Effectiveness

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Although many personal, family, and neighborhood factors contribute to a student's academic performance, a large body of research suggests that—among school-related factors—teachers matter most. RAND researchers examine and evaluate methods of measuring teacher effectiveness, as well as the critical relationship between teacher effectiveness and student achievement.

Research Brief

How Teacher Effectiveness Spills Over into Other Classrooms

May 28, 2019

Teachers' effectiveness ripples out beyond their own students and affects the experiences of their pupils' future peers. Ignoring these "spillover" effects underestimates a teacher's value by at least 30 percent.
Research Brief

Results from the Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching Initiative

Feb 11, 2019

A multiyear effort aimed at increasing students' access to effective teaching failed to achieve its goals for improved student achievement and graduation. However, the participating school districts and charter management organizations did implement better measures of teaching effectiveness.

Explore Teacher Effectiveness

Report

Report

Variation in Improvement Among Schools in the Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching

RAND researchers investigate factors that might be associated with positive student outcomes for schools that improved during the six years of the Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching initiative.

Sep 21, 2020
Research Brief

Research Brief

The Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching: A Comparison of School Outcomes

RAND researchers study the Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching initiative and find associations between school improvement and staff perceptions of school leaders' behaviors, staff cohesion, and factors outside schools' control.

Sep 21, 2020
Journal Article

Journal Article

Not Where You Start, but How Much You Grow: An Addendum to the Coleman Report

The Coleman Report (1966) first suggested that schools play a relatively small part in shaping students' achievement. The results in this paper suggest a need to update this conventional wisdom.

Jul 28, 2020
Report

How Are Educators Teaching and Leading Through the Pandemic?

U.S. teachers and principals shifted quickly to support students with distance learning during the early weeks of the coronavirus crisis. But unfortunately, the pandemic is likely to make existing inequalities worse.

Jun 22, 2020
Journal Article

Journal Article

Priming the Leadership Pipeline: School Performance and Climate Under an Urban School Leadership Residency Program

This study examines school climate and student achievement trends under an ambitious school leadership residency program in an urban school district.

Jun 16, 2020
Report

Report

Writing Instruction in U.S. Classrooms: Diverging Perspectives for Teachers Across Content Areas

This American Educator Panels Data Note provides insights into secondary teachers' perceptions of their preparedness to teach and assess writing skills and their levels of support in the classroom.

May 14, 2020
Report

Report

Using Data to Support the Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching Initiative: Data Collection, Metric and Dashboard Creation, and Lessons Learned

The Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching initiative was a multiyear effort to improve student outcomes by increasing access to effective teaching. The authors discuss challenges in measuring effectiveness and how the team addressed them.

Mar 5, 2020
Report

Report

Beyond Achievement: How Teachers Affect Outcomes Other than Test Scores

Research shows that teachers matter for both test and nontest score outcomes. Teachers who excel at raising test scores do not necessarily excel at improving other outcomes.

Dec 4, 2019
Report

Report

Measuring Teacher Effectiveness: Understanding Common, Uncommon, and Combined Methods

The author describes the three most-common methods for measuring teacher effectiveness in the United States and discusses the importance of carefully considering the ways that measures are combined to create an overall index.

Dec 4, 2019
Report

Report

Stakeholder Feedback Surveys as Indicators of Teaching Effectiveness

According to the author, stakeholder surveys address a broad range of topics related to school and classroom climate. Some types of surveys can be used for teacher-level feedback.

Dec 4, 2019
Report

Value-Added Modeling 101: Using Student Test Scores to Help Measure Teaching Effectiveness

The author discusses the use of value-added models (VAMs) to estimate teacher contribution to student progress, account for students' prior characteristics, and enable relative judgments, as well as the limitations of VAMs.

Dec 4, 2019
Report

Student Growth Percentiles 101: Using Relative Ranks in Student Test Scores to Help Measure Teaching Effectiveness

The author defines student growth percentiles (SGPs) and discusses how they are used to rank student test-score growth compared with peers and to produce a score for a teacher.

Dec 4, 2019
Report

Report

Teachers' Broad Impact: Understanding How Teachers Influence Students They Do Not Teach

The author discusses the potential ways that teachers can affect students whom they do not teach and how research suggests that a teacher's indirect reach could account for a large proportion of his or her overall contribution to student learning.

Dec 4, 2019
Report

Teachers Matter: Understanding Teachers' Impact on Student Achievement

The author articulates how research suggests that teachers are important to student achievement and how statistical methods can provide valuable but imprecise estimates of teacher effectiveness.

Dec 4, 2019
Periodical

Periodical

RAND Review: July-August 2019

This issue spotlights a strategy to reduce roadway deaths to zero; a school principal initiative that yielded positive results for schools and students; and a data-driven effort to enhance equity in a major U.S. city.

Jul 1, 2019
Report

Report

Raising the Bar for Teacher Preparation: Early Signals on How Louisiana's Education Policy Strategies Are Working Across the State

This report, part of a four-part series on the implementation and outcomes of Louisiana's education initiatives, focuses on the state's strategies for K-12 teacher preparation.

Jun 11, 2019
Blog

Theresa May, Emotional Learning, Teachers: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on Theresa May's resignation, social and emotional learning, the value of a good teacher, and more.

May 31, 2019
Blog

NATO's 70th Anniversary, Food Deserts, Teachers: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on effective teachers, NATO's 70th anniversary, food deserts, and more.

Apr 5, 2019
Journal Article

Teachers Can Make a Difference Beyond Their Own Classrooms

Schools may be undervaluing good teachers by at least 30 percent. How? Because they aren't considering the spillover effects that better-educated students have on their peers.

Apr 3, 2019

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RAND Topic:
Teacher Effectiveness

Research conducted by

RAND Education and Labor

Researcher Spotlight

Paul Youngmin Yoo

Adjunct Policy Analyst

Paul Yoo is an adjunct policy analyst at the RAND Corporation. His research interests are in the design, implementation, and evaluation of education programs and policies. He is trained in education research, quantitative and qualitative methods, and program evaluation.
Laura S. Hamilton

Senior Behavioral Scientist, Distinguished Chair in Learning and Assessment, Director, Center for Social and Emotional Learning Research

Laura Hamilton is a senior behavioral scientist and distinguished chair in learning and assessment at the RAND Corporation. She directs the RAND Center for Social and Emotional Learning Research and co-directs the American Educator Panels, RAND’s nationally representative survey panels of…

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