Scenario #1
After a teacher reviews their grade-level value added reports, they come to you and try to explain away the data, claiming that they have the students with the lowest ability and parents who do not support the school. How are you going to respond?
Your middle school math teacher is questioning the validity of his subject level value added reports. He says that his top math students are definitely learning the material, as evidenced by their high achievement scores and report card grades. He insists that his value added reports must be wrong because they show that his top math students are not making sufficient progress. Describe how you would interact with him.
As a principal in a building in school improvement, the grade-level value added reports confirm your suspicions that some of your teachers are less effective in serving their students. What should you do with this information?
Some of your teachers get extraordinarily high levels of growth with their students. What strategies can you use to leverage this information and to acknowledge these teachers contributions to student growth?
A novice teacher asks you, “How do we know if students have made a year’s worth of progress during a school year?” What is your response?
A veteran teacher asks you how the information derived from value-added analysis can be used to improve teaching and learning in your school? What is your response?
As a conscientious teacher, you have read your value-added reports and you are upset that your lowest-achieving math students did not demonstrate sufficient progress, despite all of your hard work with them. How does this make sense?
Your team shared value added results with each other and noticed that collectively you are not getting high levels of growth in mathematics from your low achievers. What can your team do to improve? You are also concerned that value added reporting may have a negative impact on the current collaborative culture that exists in your team. What can you do to address this?
Not all students enter a grade/subject with the same level of preparation. What is the principal’s role in ensuring that more and more students have an opportunity to make appropriate progress from where they enter the grade/subject?