The LA Times Invents the Teacher Box Score - 6,000 Teachers Rated By Test Scores

The LA Times rated teachers at 470 elementary schools in Los Angeles on "how effective Los Angeles Unified School District teachers have been at improving their students' performance on standardized tests".

You can go directly to the database here.

It is not surprising that the Dept. of Education and the teachers' unions are up in arms about this, and I agree, in some respects, that it is unfair to rate teachers solely based on test scores. But having said that, isn't that just how the teachers rate students and how else can you rate teachers fairly? What the unions don't want is a rating other than seniority and tenure to effect their dues paying membership. The children and effective results have nothing to do with the unions objectives.

Excerpt: If you follow education news at all, you know that the Los Angeles Times recently published a series of articles and an online database rating by name 6,000 individual teachers according to their students’ test scores, using “value-added” methodology. Predictably, this has led to a lot of caterwauling from the teachers’ union, which is calling for a boycott of the newspaper and is planning a September 14 protest in front of the Times building.

Everyone has weighed in, from U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan on down. The LA Times Invents the Teacher Box Score