Early Implementation Findings From a Study of Teacher and Principal Performance Measurement and Feedback

This is an impact study of the implementation and impacts of a set of three educator performance measures: observations of teachers' classroom practices, value-added measures of teacher performance, and a 360-degree survey assessment of principals' leadership practices. A set of elementary and middle schools within each of eight districts were randomly assigned to either a treatment group in which the study's performance measures were implemented or a control group in which they were not. A total of 127 schools participated in the study. This report provides descriptive information on the first of two years of implementation. The classroom observation and principal leadership measures were implemented generally as planned, although fewer teachers and principals accessed their value-added reports than the study intended. All three measures differentiated teacher performance, although the observation scores were mostly at the upper end of the scale. For the principal leadership measure, principal self-ratings, teachers' ratings of the principal, and the principal's supervisor's ratings of the principal often differed. Both teachers and principals in schools selected to implement the intervention reported receiving more feedback on their performance than did their counterparts in control schools.