What Does The Demographic Have to Do With It?

Amid the outcry of the release of teacher grades in New York City, it has been difficult to understand exactly how the ratings were created and how teachers are graded. Some of the more interesting statistics come from within some of the more widely considered “good” schools. According to “In Teacher Ratings, Good Test Scores Are Sometimes Not Good Enough” by Sharon Otterman and Robert Gebeloff good scores by students do not guarantee a good score for the teacher.
Teachers are compared to other teachers with similar student demographics and scores. This creates situations where teachers in schools with gifted students need by than good results, they need exceptional results. The City of New York did acknowledged the model was “too sensitive” for the teachers who had either very good or very bad scores. One reason for this is the formula used to create the scores – it has expectations.
There was one situation where the formula being used assigned a teacher working at an esteemed school on the Upper West Side a zero, the lowest possible score, because of expectations. The teacher’s students scored 1.22 standard deviations above the mean, but the expectations were for the students to be 1.84 standard deviations above the mean. Obviously, there are some kinks in the formula that need to be worked out.
The system currently implemented has its problem, but at least it is trying. At least there is some sort of public accountability – much better than no accountability at all. As a student in the public school system I do believe it is important for teachers to be held to some level of responsibility. Without it what would we come to? Anyone could be a teacher, which should not be the case. New York City and its citizens are investing money into the students. Almost half of all Americans live within 50 miles of their birthplace; meaning the more successful a student is the more likely they are to come back to New York City and create a company, create jobs, or even donate money. It is imperative to create some sort of accountability for teachers; whether this is the correct way to do it is debatable, but it must be done.