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EDUCATION REFORMS: EXPLORING 

TEACHER QUALITY INITIATIVES 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION 

AND THE WORKFORCE 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, JULY 27, 2011 

Serial No. 112–35 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Education and the Workforce 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: 

www.gpo.gov/fdsys/browse/committee.action?chamber=house&committee=education 

or 

Committee address: http://edworkforce.house.gov 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND THE WORKFORCE 

JOHN KLINE, Minnesota, Chairman 

Thomas E. Petri, Wisconsin 

Howard P. ‘‘Buck’’ McKeon, California 

Judy Biggert, Illinois 

Todd Russell Platts, Pennsylvania 

Joe Wilson, South Carolina 

Virginia Foxx, North Carolina 

Bob Goodlatte, Virginia 

Duncan Hunter, California 

David P. Roe, Tennessee 

Glenn Thompson, Pennsylvania 

Tim Walberg, Michigan 

Scott DesJarlais, Tennessee 

Richard L. Hanna, New York 

Todd Rokita, Indiana 

Larry Bucshon, Indiana 

Trey Gowdy, South Carolina 

Lou Barletta, Pennsylvania 

Kristi L. Noem, South Dakota 

Martha Roby, Alabama 

Joseph J. Heck, Nevada 

Dennis A. Ross, Florida 

Mike Kelly, Pennsylvania 

George Miller, California, 

Senior Democratic Member 

Dale E. Kildee, Michigan 

Donald M. Payne, New Jersey 

Robert E. Andrews, New Jersey 

Robert C. ‘‘Bobby’’ Scott, Virginia 

Lynn C. Woolsey, California 

Rube ́n Hinojosa, Texas 

Carolyn McCarthy, New York 

John F. Tierney, Massachusetts 

Dennis J. Kucinich, Ohio 

David Wu, Oregon 

Rush D. Holt, New Jersey 

Susan A. Davis, California 

Rau ́l M. Grijalva, Arizona 

Timothy H. Bishop, New York 

David Loebsack, Iowa 

Mazie K. Hirono, Hawaii 

Barrett Karr, Staff Director 

Jody Calemine, Minority Staff Director 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hearing held on July 27, 2011 ............................................................................... 1 

Statement of Members: 

Kline, Hon. John, Chairman, Committee on Education and the Workforce 1 

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 3 

Miller, Hon. George, senior democratic member, Committee on Education 

and the Workforce ......................................................................................... 4 

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 6 

Statement of Witnesses: 

Boasberg, Thomas, superintendent, School District No. 1, City and County of Denver ................................................................................................... 15 

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 17 

Cicarella, David, president, New Haven Federation of Teachers ................. 32 

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 33 

Huffman, Hon. Kevin, Tennessee Commissioner of Education .................... 9 

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 11 

Walsh, Kate, president, National Council on Teacher Quality ..................... 35 

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 38 

(1) 

EDUCATION REFORMS: EXPLORING 

TEACHER QUALITY INITIATIVES 

Wednesday, July 27, 2011 

U.S. House of Representatives 

Committee on Education and the Workforce 

Washington, DC 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:03 a.m., in room 

2175, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John Kline [chairman 

of the committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Kline, Petri, Biggert, Foxx, Goodlatte, 

Roe, Thompson, DesJarlais, Hanna, Bucshon, Noem, Heck, Miller, 

Payne, Woolsey, Hinojosa, McCarthy, Tierney, Kucinich, Holt, 

Davis, Bishop, and Loebsack. 

Also Present: Senator Bennet, Representatives DeLauro and 

Polis. 

Staff Present: Jennifer Allen, Press Secretary; Katherine 

Bathgate, Press Assistant/New Media Coordinator; James 

Bergeron, Director of Education and Human Services Policy; Casey 

Buboltz, Coalitions and Member Services Coordinator; Heather 

Couri, Deputy Director of Education and Human Services Policy; 

Lindsay Fryer, Professional Staff Member; Daniela Garcia, Professional Staff Member; Barrett Karr, Staff Director; Rosemary 

Lahasky, Professional Staff Member; Brian Melnyk, Legislative Assistant; Krisann Pearce, General Counsel; Alex Sollberger, Communications Director; Linda Stevens, Chief Clerk/Assistant to the 

General Counsel; Alissa Strawcutter, Deputy Clerk; Brad Thomas, 

Senior Education Policy Advisor; Kate Ahlgren, Minority Investigative Counsel; Tylease Alli, Minority Clerk; Daniel Brown, Minority 

Junior Legislative Assistant; Jamie Fasteau, Minority Deputy Director of Education Policy (Counsel); Brian Levin, Minority New 

Media Press Assistant; Kara Marchione, Minority Senior Education 

Policy Advisor; Megan O’Reilly, Minority General Counsel; Julie 

Peller, Minority Deputy Staff Director; Helen Pajcic, Minority Education Policy Advisor; Melissa Salmanowitz, Minority Communications Director for Education; and Laura Schifter, Minority Senior 

Education and Disability Advisor. 

Chairman KLINE. A quorum being present, the committee will 

come to order. 

Good morning. Welcome to our committee hearing on teacher 

quality initiatives. I would like to thank our witnesses for joining 

us today. Your time is valuable, and we appreciate the opportunity 

to get your perspective on how States, school districts, and the fed-
2 

eral government can support and encourage more effective teachers. 

Current law recognizes a teacher as highly qualified if he or she 

holds a bachelor’s degree, is certified to teach in the State, and has 

subject matter and teaching knowledge as determined by a State 

test. While these are certainly important criteria for educators, 

none of these factors alone can determine whether someone will be 

an effective teacher capable of motivating students and improving 

achievement levels. 

The best teachers are those who keep students engaged, challenged, and progressing in the classroom. As members of this committee have discussed, the challenges facing the nation’s education 

system with superintendents, principals, and community leaders 

this year, we have heard impressive stories of the bright men and 

women who are entering the field of teaching and bringing a new 

wave of creativity and innovation to K-12 classrooms. 

A few months ago, a superintendent in my home State of Minnesota shared the story of a promising young teacher in his school. 

This teacher made great strides in improving the reading skills of 

male students by pioneering a groundbreaking program called Boys 

Like to Read. His popularity with students, combined with the success of the program, earned him recognition as the teacher of the 

year. This and other examples from around the country illustrate 

what research has long professed: the most important factor in student success is an effective teacher in the classroom. 

Unfortunately, instead of receiving a bonus or promotion or opportunity to help other teachers replicate his successful teaching 

style in their own classrooms, this teacher of the year was let go 

from his school, where he was recognized for his accomplishments 

and appreciated by his students, parents, and administrators alike, 

all because of a ‘‘last in, first out’’ tenure rule. 

Valuing credentials and tenure over student outcomes is completely unacceptable. Every student deserves to be inspired and 

challenged by an outstanding educator, not one who has lost interest in helping students succeed but is protected by rigid teacher 

tenure rules. As we work to reform the nation’s education system, 

the committee will support State and local efforts to recruit and 

maintain more effective teachers in the nation’s classrooms. 

In Tennessee, for example, State legislators have developed a 

new law that revamps the evaluation system. As a result, teachers 

must undergo a thorough annual evaluation process based on student achievement levels and subjective measures, such as classroom observations. Earlier this year, the State went one step further by tying the results of these evaluations to meaningful consequences: teachers whose evaluations reflect sub-par performance 

in the classroom can have their tenure revoked. We will hear more 

about this new system from one of our witnesses today. 

School districts in Indiana are now required to take student 

achievement gains into account when developing new teacher evaluations. To attract more effective teachers to the classroom, the 

State is developing more rigorous professional development programs and has created a Beginning Teacher Residency program 

that authorizes school administrators to assess a new teacher’s per-
3 

formance and provide a personalized plan for professional development. 

Indiana has also undertaken an initiative long supported by Republicans in Congress: taking an educator’s performance in the 

classroom into account when making salary determinations. For 

years, we have championed programs that support performance 

pay measures. One such program, the Teacher Incentive Fund, 

awards competitive grants to States, school districts, and public 

charter schools to design and implement performance pay compensation systems for teachers and principals who improve student 

achievement. 

We all know there can be no one-size-fits-all federal solution for 

ensuring an effective teacher is in every classroom. However, we 

can make sure our efforts in Washington, D.C., do not undermine 

teachers’ and principals’ ability to make decisions that best suit 

their students’ unique needs. At the same time, there are many interesting developments happening at the State and local level that 

should be encouraged, and that is what we are here to explore 

today. I would like to thank our witnesses once again for joining 

us, and I look forward to learning more about what States and 

school districts are doing to recruit and maintain effective teachers 

in classrooms across the country. 

I will now recognize my distinguished colleague, George Miller, 

the Senior Democratic Member of the committee, for his opening 

remarks. 

[The statement of Mr. Kline follows:] 

Prepared Statement of Hon. John Kline, Chairman, 

Committee on Education and the Workforce 

Good morning, and welcome to our committee hearing on teacher quality initiatives. I’d like to thank our witnesses for joining us today. Your time is valuable and 

we appreciate the opportunity to get your perspective on how states, school districts, 

and the federal government can support and encourage more effective teachers. 

Current law recognizes a teacher as ‘‘highly qualified’’ if he or she holds a bachelor’s degree, is certified or licensed to teach in the state, and has subject matter 

and teaching knowledge as determined by a state test. While these are certainly important criteria for our educators, none of these factors alone can determine whether 

someone will be an effective teacher capable of motivating students and improving 

achievement levels. 

The best teachers are those who keep students engaged, challenged, and progressing in the classroom. As members of this committee have discussed the challenges facing the nation’s education system with superintendents, principals, and 

community leaders this year, we have heard impressive stories of the bright men 

and women who are entering the field of teaching and bringing a new wave of creativity and innovation to K-12 classrooms. 

A few months ago, a superintendent in my home state of Minnesota shared the 

story of a promising young teacher in his school. This teacher made great strides 

in improving the reading skills of male students by pioneering a groundbreaking 

program called Boys Like to Read. His popularity with students combined with the 

success of the program earned him recognition as the ‘‘Teacher of the Year.’’ This 

and other examples from around the country illustrate what research has long professed: the most important factor in student success is an effective teacher in the 

classroom. 

Unfortunately, instead of receiving a bonus or promotion or opportunity to help 

other teachers replicate his successful teaching style in their own classrooms, this 

Teacher of the Year was let go from his school—where he was recognized for his 

accomplishments and appreciated by students, parents, and administrators alike— 

all because of misguided ‘‘last in first out’’ tenure rules. 

Valuing credentials and tenure over student outcomes is completely unacceptable. 

Every student deserves to be inspired and challenged by an outstanding educator, 

not one who has lost interest in helping students succeed, but is protected by rigid 
4 

teacher tenure rules. As we work to reform the nation’s education system, the committee will support state and local efforts to recruit and maintain more effective 

teachers in the nation’s classrooms. 

In Tennessee, for example, state legislators have developed a new law that revamps the evaluation system. As a result, teachers must undergo a thorough annual 

evaluation process based on student achievement levels and subjective measures, 

such as classroom observations. Earlier this year, the state went one step further 

by tying the results of these evaluations to meaningful consequences: teachers 

whose evaluations reflect subpar performance in the classroom can have their tenure revoked. We will hear more about this new system from one of our witnesses 

today. 

School districts in Indiana are now required to take student achievement gains 

into account when developing new teacher evaluations. To attract more effective 

teachers to the classroom, the state is developing more rigorous professional development programs, and has created a Beginning Teacher Residency program that authorizes school administrators to assess a new teacher’s performance and provide a 

personalized plan for professional development. 

Indiana has also undertaken an initiative long supported by Republicans in Congress: taking an educator’s performance in the classroom into account when making 

salary determinations. For years, we have championed programs that support performance pay measures. One such program, the Teacher Incentive Fund, awards 

competitive grants to states, school districts, and public charter schools to design 

and implement performance pay compensation systems for teachers and principals 

who improve student achievement. 

We all know there can be no one-size-fits-all federal solution for ensuring an effective teacher is in every classroom. However, we can make sure our efforts in Washington, D.C. do not undermine teachers’ and principals’ ability to make decisions 

that best suit their students’ unique needs. At the same time, there are many interesting developments happening at the state and local level that should be encouraged, and that’s what we’re here to explore today. I’d like to thank our witnesses 

once again for joining us, and I look forward to learning more about what states 

and school districts are doing to recruit and maintain effective teachers in classrooms across the country. 

I will now recognize my distinguished colleague George Miller, the senior Democratic member of the committee, for his opening remarks. 

Mr. MILLER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you 

for holding this hearing. 

I note with a smile when you say that the rather minimal requirements we have for a highly qualified teacher is the idea of 

subject matter competency, with a B.A. degree and certification 

from the State; and I reflect back how hard-fought that was to get 

that in the law in No Child Left Behind. 

But then I remember back even prior to that when I offered an 

amendment on the floor of the Congress saying that I thought we 

ought to have teachers in the classroom who have subject matter 

competency. I lost that amendment 434 to 1. 

So we have come a long way, and I think the conversation today 

will suggest how far we have come. But there is a lot of work to 

do here as we think about the teaching profession and what we 

owe our children and how we can improve it. 

And we have spent a considerable amount of time in this committee looking into how a federal policy can best support great 

teachers in this country. It is an effort that is worth our time, because I know we will hear time and again today that teachers are 

the single most important factor in a child’s education outside of 

the home. 

Student success is nearly entirely reliant on the quality and commitment of teachers at his or her classroom. And for poor and minority students, access to good teachers is an issue of equity. Poor 

and minority students are taught by novice and out-of-field teach-
5 

ers at a much higher rate than their more affluent peers. The very 

students who could benefit most from the very best teachers are 

least likely to get them. Our federal education policy should 

prioritize access to high-quality teachers for all students, including 

better measurements of identifying high-quality teachers. 

It is a productive exercise to talk about how we can improve and 

modernize the teaching profession, because these conversations will 

hopefully lead to better policies and improve student success. What 

is not productive are the attacks that we have seen on teachers 

across the country from Republican governors. In trying to strip 

teachers of all their collective bargaining rights except for negotiations over pay, these governors are showing how out of touch they 

are with today’s teaching profession, school reform in America, and, 

frankly, the American workplace. 

All over America, school districts are changing the rules from the 

mere platitudes that teachers are the most important influence 

outside the home in the education of our children to really making 

that possible. School districts in unionized areas, where some said 

it could never happen, are soliciting—imagine that—they are soliciting teachers’ views on how we might improve the learning and 

teaching environment. And it will continue, because it reflects what 

great teachers view as the modern workplace, where results and 

outcomes matter to students, parents, teachers, and the community. 

Any efforts to help teachers must be done with those teachers, 

not to them. It is time we treated the teaching profession like any 

other modern workplace, with support, resources, real professional 

development, and real rewards. 

We now have to create a system where we as a nation are participants in the reconstitution of our schools. This is not to be done 

by experts. This will not be done by researchers or corporate executives. This reconstitution will have to be done by communities and 

by teachers who know what is best for our schools and our communities, for the children and their parents. 

The real change will require buy-in from all levels of the community. A great example of parents taking charge and the community 

being involved is the parent trigger law in California. In Los Angeles, the community decided that their schools simply weren’t good 

enough for their children, the parents in that attendance area. 

These students deserved better and deserved attention from the 

district. The parents came together and decided to demand change 

in the schools. The law finally gave them the means by which to 

act. 

Buy-in isn’t just nodding your head and agreeing that something 

needs to happen. Buy-in is helping to be part of the improvement. 

It means superintendents and principals that can look toward the 

future. It means moving the teaching profession into the 21st century and finally giving teachers a modern workplace and rewarding 

success, encouraging growth, raising expectations, and measuring 

outcomes. 

It is simply not enough for a small few of our students to have 

access to the best schools and the best teachers. If we want to have 

the best and the brightest in the world, it is time we demand the 

best. 
6 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses. Thank you again 

for this hearing and thank you to our witnesses for being here. 

[The statement of Mr. Miller follows:] 

Prepared Statement of Hon. George Miller, Senior Democratic Member, 

Committee on Education and the Workforce 

Thank you Mr. Chairman and good morning. The subject of today’s hearing is 

nothing new to this committee. 

I’ve focused my career in Washington on helping teachers and improving the 

teaching profession. In fact, I once proposed an amendment that would’ve required 

teachers in the classroom to have subject matter competency in the areas where 

they were teaching. I lost that vote 434-1. 

Thankfully, this Congress has changed quite a bit since then and there’s now a 

growing consensus that we need to provide teachers as much support as we can. 

We’ve spent considerable time looking into how our federal policy can best support 

great teachers in this country. 

It’s an effort that is worth our time because as I know we’ll hear time and time 

again today, the teacher is the single most important factor in a child’s education 

today. 

Student success is nearly entirely reliant on the quality and commitment of the 

teacher in his or her classroom. 

And for poor and minority students, access to good teachers is an issue of equity. 

Poor and minority students are taught by novice and out-of-field teachers at much 

higher rates than their more affluent peers. 

The very students who could benefit the most from the very best teachers are the 

least likely to get them. Our federal education policy should prioritize access to high 

quality teachers for all students, including better measures of identifying high quality teachers. 

It’s a productive exercise to talk about how we can improve and modernize the 

teaching profession because these conversations will hopefully lead to better policies 

and improve student success. 

What is not productive are the attacks we’ve seen on teachers across the country 

from Republican governors. 

In trying to strip teachers of all collective bargaining rights except for negotiations over pay, these governors are showing how out of touch they are with today’s 

teaching profession, school reform in America, and, frankly, the American workplace. 

All over America school districts are changing the rules from the mere platitudes 

that teachers are the most important influence outside the home in the education 

of our children to really making that possible. 

School districts, in unionized areas where some said it could never happen, are 

soliciting teacher’s views to improve both the learning and teaching environment. 

And it will continue because it reflects what great teachers view as the modern 

workplace where results and outcomes matter to students, parents, teachers and the 

community. 

Any efforts to help teachers must be done WITH teachers not to them. It’s time 

we treated the teaching profession like any other modern workplace, with support, 

resources, real professional development and real rewards. 

We now have to create a system where we as nation participate in the reconstitution of our schools. This will not be done by experts. This will not be done by researchers or corporate executives. This will have to be done by communities and by 

teachers who know what’s best for our schools. 

Real change will require buy in from all levels of communities. A great example 

of parents taking charge and the community being involved is the parent trigger law 

in California. In Los Angeles, the community decided that their schools simply 

weren’t good enough for children. Their students deserved better and deserved attention from the district. The parents came together and decided to demand change 

in the schools. The law finally gave them the means in which to act. 

Buy in isn’t just nodding your head and agreeing something NEEDS to happen. 

Buy in has to be helping be a part of the improvement. It means superintendents 

and principals that can look toward the future. 

It means treating moving the teaching profession in to the 21st century by finally 

giving teachers a modern workplace, rewarding success, encouraging growth and 

raising expectations. 

It’s simply not enough for a small few of our students to have access to the best 

schools and the best teachers. If we want to have the best and the brightest in the 
7 

world, it’s time we demand the best. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses. 

Thank you for being here today. 

Chairman KLINE. I thank the gentleman. 

Pursuant to committee rule 7(c), all members will be permitted 

to submit written statements to be included in the permanent 

hearing record. Without objection, the hearing record will remain 

open for 14 days to allow questions for the record, statements, and 

extraneous material referenced during the hearing to be submitted 

for the official hearing record. 

I will now move to introducing our distinguished witnesses. 

Today, I get a lot of help in that effort. We are pleased to have 

some folks here on the committee—— 

And, by the way, as you probably have surmised, there are some 

conference meetings under way discussing an issue which seems to 

be sort of prevalent out there. So my expectation is that members 

from both sides will be coming in during the course of this hearing. 

To introduce our first witness, I will turn to my colleague from 

Tennessee, Dr. Roe. 

Mr. ROE. The reason I am here is I have overdosed on conferences. I couldn’t take any more conferences. 

Thank all the committee members for being here. 

On behalf of myself and Dr. DesJarlais, I would like to welcome 

Kevin Huffman, the commissioner of Tennessee’s Department of 

Education. 

Before being appointed in April by Governor Bill Haslam, Mr. 

Huffman spent nearly two decades working with public education 

systems as a teacher, lawyer, and a nonprofit executive and nonprofit board member. Commissioner Huffman began his education 

career as a first and second grade bilingual teacher in the Houston 

Independent School District, teaching students in English and 

Spanish. He was a member of his school’s elected, shared, decisionmaking committee and trained new teachers as a faculty advisor 

and school director at Teach for America’s summer training institutes. Mr. Huffman joined the senior management of Teach for 

America in 2000, serving as the general counsel, the senior vice 

president of growth strategy and development, and the executive 

vice president of public affairs during more than a decade with the 

organization. 

Commissioner Huffman, I look forward to your testimony regarding exciting work in education taking place in Tennessee, and welcome. 

Chairman KLINE. I will add my welcome. 

And, moving on, I am pleased to welcome Senator Bennet from 

Colorado to make the introduction of our second witness. 

Senator Bennet. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to thank you and the ranking member for holding 

this important hearing and having me here today and giving me 

the privilege of introducing my friend, Tom Boasberg, who was appointed superintendent of the Denver Public Schools in January of 

2009. 

Tom Boasberg has led the district’s efforts to accelerate its 

progress in student achievement and better serve the families of 

Denver. Over the past 2 years, the district has posted record enroll-
8 

ment increases, dramatically expanded the number of preschool 

and full-day kindergarten slots, cut the number of lowest-performing schools in half, and continued the student achievement 

gains that began with the creation of the Denver Plan in 2005. 

In 2010, Denver Public Schools graduated about 13 percent more 

seniors than the previous year. The district had four of the top five 

schools for year to year academic growth in the State of Colorado, 

and DPS continues a 5-year trend of academic achievement gains 

that has outpaced all other school districts in Colorado. In addition, 

in the last 4 years, the Denver Public Schools has seen a 40 percent decrease in the dropout rate. 

Before becoming superintendent, Mr. Boasberg had a distinguished career in the private and public sectors. But, Mr. Chairman, as I mentioned to you before the hearing, the real reason I 

am here is to ask you to please disregard anything he says negative about his predecessor, namely me, during the course of his testimony. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KLINE. Without objection. Thank you, Senator, and 

welcome. 

Next, I am happy to welcome Ms. DeLauro from Connecticut to 

our committee today to introduce our today’s third witness. 

Ms. DELAURO. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to thank you and our Ranking Member Miller for giving 

me this opportunity to introduce one of my constituents, David 

Cicarella, who is president of the New Haven Federation of Teachers. As the union president, David led the school reform efforts of 

the Federation, producing a new 4-year contract that emphasized 

collaboration, cooperation with New Haven’s public schools, with 

their central office, and with the school board. 

The contract incorporates new, innovative measures for a teacher 

evaluation system that is being referenced nationwide as the, 

quote, ‘‘New Haven model.’’ It came about thanks to New Haven 

Mayor John DeStefano, New Haven Schools Superintendent Dr. 

Reginald Mayo, and our local teachers union all making the decision to work collaboratively through the existing collective bargaining process. 

David was instrumental in making it happen. He worked hard 

to build the support for the contract among his members. He was 

supported by the national affiliate throughout the process. And because of his hard work, our City of New Haven has led the way 

in demonstrating to the entire Nation that strong teachers’ unions, 

strong schools, and strong education reforms are all part of the 

piece. It demonstrated a forward-thinking flexibility by all parties, 

a reaffirmation of the central importance of teachers’ unions to our 

education system, and a positive and demonstrable commitment to 

real school reform by everyone involved. 

Along with heading the local AFT chapter, David knows the New 

Haven school system inside and out. Prior to his election as the 

union president in January of 2007, he was a classroom teacher, 

staff developer, instructional coach for 28 years, teaching science, 

reading, and math. For 5 years prior to becoming union president, 

he also taught mathematics courses at Gateway Community College in New Haven. 
9 

So today’s discussion is about teachers, their professional development, most importantly, how to ensure we are delivering the 

best possible education for our children. On these crucial matters 

it really is an honor for me to introduce my constituent, David 

Cicarella, to you; and I thank you for choosing him to testify before 

your committee today. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KLINE. I thank the gentlelady and add my welcome to 

Mr. Cicarella. 

Now it is my turn. I have the pleasure of introducing our final 

witness for today’s hearing. Ms. Kate Walsh became president of 

the National Council on Teacher Quality in 2002. Before joining 

NCTQ, she worked for the Abell Foundation in Baltimore, the Baltimore City Public Schools, and the Core Knowledge Foundation. 

Her work has tackled a broad spectrum of educational issues, with 

a primary focus on the needs of children who are disadvantaged by 

poverty and race. She also serves on the Maryland State Board of 

Education. 

So welcome. 

Before I recognize each of you to provide your testimony, let me 

again briefly explain our lighting system. You will each have 5 

minutes to give your testimony. All of your statements will be entered in their entirety in the record. 

When you start, there is a little lighting system in front of you. 

There will be a green light that comes on. After 4 minutes, when 

you have 1 minute remaining, the light will turn yellow. When the 

5 minutes are up, it will turn red; and I would ask you then to 

please summarize as quickly as you can. I am reluctant to bang the 

gavel while you are still speaking, but we also have a responsibility 

to keep this moving. 

So, again, welcome to you all; and we will start now. I will just 

move down the line, and we will start with Mr. Huffman. 

Sir, you are recognized. 

STATEMENT OF HON. KEVIN S. HUFFMAN, COMMISSIONER, 

TENNESSEE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Thank you, Chairman Kline and Ranking Member Miller and committee members. Thanks for having me and for 

taking the time to engage in thoughtful discussion about the role 

that teachers and teacher evaluation can play. 

This coming school year, Tennessee will launch our new statewide teacher evaluation system. Teachers will receive an evaluation score from 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest. Thirty-five percent 

of the evaluation will be determined by value-added scores from 

standardized tests. Fifteen percent of the evaluation will be determined by other student achievement metrics. Fifty percent of the 

evaluation will be a qualitative score based upon classroom observation. 

I want to pause here, though, and note something that I think 

is important. No evaluation protocol is perfect. In my mind, one of 

our great national failings in the discussion about teacher evaluation is that we consistently allow ourselves to be derailed through 

the unattainable concept of a perfect system. The reality, of course, 

is that evaluation in every field is imperfect; and our quest, in-
10 

stead, should be to create the best possible system and make sure 

that we continue to reflect on that system and refine it over time. 

In Tennessee, we think evaluations should be used for several 

key things: first, to support teachers by providing helpful feedback 

in real time; second, to identify the top performers in the field so 

that we can study and learn from them, recognize them, and extend their impact; and, third, to identify teachers in need of improvement so that we can tailor professional development and, in 

the case of a small percentage, exit them from the profession. 

For the qualitative 50 percent of Tennessee’s evaluation model, 

we field tested three different observation rubrics last year, with 

very positive results. We also gathered input from our legislatively 

appointed Teacher Evaluation Advisory Committee, a 15-person 

committee, including eight educators. Ultimately, we selected the 

TAP rubric, which is the observation tool used in the Teacher Advancement Program, because of its strong performance in the field 

test but also because TAP was able to provide a high level of training and support for our first year of implementation. 

The TAP rubric measures teachers against 19 indicators on a 1- 

to-5 scale, with clearly defined, observable criteria. Teachers will be 

observed by principals, assistant principals, or other instructional 

coaches. There will be a minimum of four observations a year for 

veterans and a minimum of six observations a year for apprentice 

teachers. At least half of the observations must be unannounced, 

and at least half of the observations have to happen during the 

first semester so that teachers are getting feedback early in the 

year. The observations are followed within a week with both written and verbal feedback. 

In order to become an observer, principals and other school leaders must go through rigorous training and pass a certification test. 

We have this summer trained nearly 5,000 observers in very intensive 4-day sessions. Each observer must pass an inter-rater reliability test in which they watch videotaped lessons on line and answer questions. 

On the quantitative side, Tennessee has been collecting longitudinal data on students, with links to teachers, for nearly two decades and has produced value-added scores for teachers in tested 

subjects and grades for years. For the roughly 45 percent of our 

teachers who teach in tested subjects and grade levels, the student 

growth component of the evaluation will be based on these valueadded scores. 

For teachers in non-tested subjects and grade levels, in most instances we will this year use a school-wide value-added score. For 

instance, an elementary school art teacher would be rated based on 

the value-added score of the school for the 35 percent of the evaluation. 

Now, I want to identify with transparency some of the critiques 

of our system and how we are thinking about them. 

First, on the qualitative observations, while in the field test, 

teachers and principals had a very positive response to the rubric, 

we have heard some concerns. Some teachers worry that observers 

won’t do a good job, and we are attempting to address that concern 

through rigorous training and through ongoing support. 
11 

Also, principals are being evaluated on how well they implement 

the teacher evaluation system. But in the end, as in every profession, we can’t guarantee that every boss is a good boss. Some principals are worried that the time required is too much, but the field 

test demonstrated that this should not be a concern. And, more importantly, our evaluation system propels a critical cultural shift in 

the job description of principals. Principals are now no longer simply building and budget managers. They have to take responsibility 

for instruction and for the development of talent in their schools. 

And, finally, the largest challenge I see on the qualitative side 

is trying to ensure consistency in the range of distribution of the 

observation scores, which we are trying to do through central 

tracking and then engagement with the districts. 

Quickly, for the quantitative piece, the biggest critique currently 

is from teachers in the untested subjects and grade levels. Many 

feel it is unfair to be assessed through school-wide value-added 

scores, and what we are doing this year is making sure that we 

field test other assessments across the State for different fields. 

Then, for the following school year, we would like to offer districts, at their discretion, the ability to use additional assessments; 

and we anticipate that some districts would choose to use those assessments, while other districts may continue to believe that 

school-wide data is actually appropriate for teachers in some circumstances. 

I want to thank you for having me. This is a work in progress. 

We are learning a lot from this system. I do think it is really important that we all stay grounded in the idea that evaluation is important, that it is always going to be somewhat subjective and imperfect, and that the important thing is that we study it, learn 

from it, and keep making it better over time. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Mr. Huffman follows:] 

Prepared Statement of Hon. Kevin Huffman, 

Tennessee Commissioner of Education 

Chairman Kline, Ranking Member Miller and committee members, I am Kevin 

Huffman, Commissioner of Education in Tennessee. Thank you for inviting me to 

testify about our work to improve education for our nearly 950,000 public school students in the state. 

I want to thank the Committee for taking the time to engage in thoughtful discussion about the role that teachers and teacher evaluation can play in the effort to 

build a better education system. We are grappling with many complicated questions 

in Tennessee, and I hope that our experiences will be helpful as you consider the 

broader implications. 

Let me start by providing some context about our work. I was appointed by our 

newly elected governor, Bill Haslam, and have been in this position for a little 

under four months. Tennessee has been working on a variety of education reforms 

for much longer, with broad bipartisan and community support. While the current 

legislature and governor are Republican, the bill creating our teacher evaluation 

system was passed by a bipartisan legislature and signed by Governor Bredesen, 

our Democratic predecessor, who did significant work to advance reforms in education. This work has been continued and accelerated by Governor Haslam, who led 

the effort to implement many reforms, and to pass landmark tenure and charter 

school legislation this year. 

The legislature and Governors have acted in large measure because our education 

system has not delivered acceptable results. Tennessee ranks around 43rd in the nation in student achievement. At the same time, our state assessments historically 

showed that around 90 percent of our students were proficient. Additionally, virtually all teachers were automatically tenured after three years, and tenured teach-
12 

ers were evaluated (without data) twice every ten years. The system was broken, 

and a bipartisan coalition of political leaders stepped in and took action. 

Beyond the legislative work, there is broad community support for education reform in Tennessee. While he is known here in Washington for different work, Bill 

Frist started an organization in Tennessee called SCORE, which pulls together the 

business, education, philanthropic and local civic organizations under one umbrella 

to talk about schools. It has been enormously successful in gathering input and 

building consensus for change in the state. 

This coming school year—2011-12—Tennessee will launch our new statewide 

teacher evaluation system. Let me describe how it will work: • Teachers will receive an evaluation score from 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest. • 35% of the evaluation will be determined by value-added scores, or comparable 

growth scores, from standardized tests. • 15% of the evaluation will be determined by other student achievement metrics, 

selected through a joint-decision by principals and individual teachers. • 50% of the evaluation will be a qualitative score based on classroom observation. 

These components are in the legislation, and our job at the state department of 

education is to help districts and schools implement the evaluation system as well 

as possible. 

I want to pause here, though, and note something that I think is important. No 

evaluation protocol is perfect. There is no system that is 100% objective, 100% 

aligned and normed, and 100% reliable. One of our great national failings in the 

discussion about teacher evaluation is that we consistently allow ourselves to be derailed through the lofty and unattainable concept of the perfect system. The reality, 

of course, is that evaluation in every field is imperfect. The quest is not to create 

a perfect system. The quest is to create the best possible system, and to continue 

to reflect on and refine that system over time. 

In Tennessee, we think evaluation should be used for several key things. First, 

support teachers by providing helpful feedback in real time so that they can continue to improve their craft. Second, identify the top performers in the field so that 

we can study and learn from them, recognize them for their work, and extend their 

impact by building meaningful career pathways that allow them to touch ever-more 

kids. Third, identify teachers in need of improvement so that we can tailor professional development to their needs and, in the case of a small percentage who cannot 

reach a bar of effectiveness, exit them from the profession. Because the national 

conversation has often focused primarily on evaluation as a means for removal of 

ineffective teachers, we too often lose sight of the way the vast majority of teachers 

will experience the evaluation system: as a means for feedback and professional development, and an opportunity to learn from the very best teachers. 

As we prepare for full state implementation of our evaluation system this year, 

we are working on the challenges of both the qualitative and the quantitative components. I will describe briefly how the system works, what the challenges and critiques are, and how we are attempting to address those considerations. 

For the qualitative 50%, we field-tested three different observation rubrics and 

rating systems across the state last school year, with very positive results. We also 

gathered input from our legislatively appointed TEAC committee—the Teacher 

Evaluation Advisory Committee—which met more than 20 times over the course of 

the year to craft policy guidelines and criteria, review field test data, offer ideas 

about additional implementation needs, and to make recommendations about the 

quantitative and qualitative data components. This 15-person committee included 

eight educators, the executive director of the State Board of education, a legislator 

and several other business and community stakeholders. 

Ultimately, we have selected the TAP rubric (the observation tool used in the 

Teacher Advancement Program) both because of its strong performance in the field 

test with teachers and principals, but also because TAP was able to provide the 

level of training and support that we need for the first year of implementation. Here 

is how this works. 

The TAP rubric measures teachers against 19 indicators across 4 domains on a 

1 to 5 scale, with clearly defined, observable criteria. Teachers will be observed by 

principals, assistant principals, or other instructional coaches or leaders designated 

by the principals. There will be a minimum of four observations a year for professionally licensed teachers, and a minimum of six observations a year for apprentice 

teachers. At least half of the observations must be unannounced. At least half of 

the observations must be during the first semester so that teachers get feedback 

early in the year. The observations vary in length, from full lesson-length observations, to 15-minute walk-throughs, and are followed within a week with both written 

and verbal feedback. 
13 

In order to become an observer, principals and other school leaders must go 

through rigorous state-facilitated training, and must pass a certification test. We 

have, this summer, trained nearly 5,000 observers in very intensive four-day sessions led by expert TAP trainers. Each observer then must pass an inter-rater reliability test in which they watch video taped lessons on-line and answer questions 

to ensure that they understand what constitutes low, medium and high performance 

on the different components of the rubric. They must also demonstrate the ability 

to provide high-quality feedback based on the observed lesson by submitting a postobservation conference plan. 

On the quantitative side, Tennessee has been collecting longitudinal data on students, with links to teachers, for nearly two decades and has produced value-added 

scores for teachers in tested subjects and grades for years. For the roughly 45% of 

our teachers who teach in tested subjects and grade-levels (essentially, third 

through eighth grade in science, social studies, language arts and math, and high 

school end of course exams), the student growth component of the evaluation will 

be based on the same value-added scores that the state has generated and used over 

time. 

For the teachers in non-tested subjects and grade levels, to meet the statutory requirement of 35% of a teacher’s evaluation tying to student growth data, in most 

instances we will use a school-wide growth score for this coming year. For instance, 

an elementary school art teacher will be rated based on the value-added score of 

the school for the 35% of the evaluation. Simultaneously, we are working closely 

with Tennessee educators and technical experts in subject matter committees to 

identify and develop comparable, alternative growth measures in these non-tested 

subjects and grades. 

Let me identify with transparency some of the critiques of our system and how 

we are thinking about them. 

First, the qualitative observations: In the field test, teachers and principals had 

an overwhelmingly positive response to the rubric, liked the observation protocol, 

and in particular liked the forced face-to-face feedback sessions with school leaders. 

Teachers felt like the process of observation and real-time, targeted feedback increased their ability to provide their students with effective instruction, and principals learned much more about their teachers’ work and how to act as instructional 

leaders. 

That said, there are a number of concerns that teachers, principals and superintendents (generally, ones who did not participate in the field test) have aired in 

my many visits around the state. First, teachers worry that that the observers will 

not be effective because of skill limitations. We are attempting to address that real 

concern through rigorous training and through ongoing support. We will have nine 

coaches across the state who will be going into buildings this year and re-training 

and helping support administrators who may struggle with the new demands of this 

system. Additionally, principals are being evaluated this year, and part of the principal evaluation includes an assessment of how well they implement the teacher 

evaluation. In the end, though, we cannot guarantee that every boss is a good boss. 

This is true in every profession and every walk of life. 

With so many competing demands, principals worry that the time required is too 

much. The field test demonstrated however, that this should not be a concern. By 

designating additional administrators and getting them trained through the state 

program, principals should spend an average of five hours a week observing and 

conferencing with teachers if they plan their schedules and pace their observations 

effectively. More importantly, though, this evaluation system propels a critical cultural shift and growing trend in the job description of principals. Principals are no 

longer simply building and budget managers. They must take responsibility for instruction and for the development of talent in their schools in order for us to meet 

our ambitious state goals over the coming years. 

Finally, the largest challenge I see is trying to ensure consistency in the range 

of distribution for the observation scores. By this, I mean that we would like the 

same teacher using the same lesson to get the same score across different schools 

and across different districts. This also includes achieving a reasonable, consistent 

relationship between the quantitative and qualitative components for individual 

teachers across schools, districts and educator groups throughout the state. This 

level of consistency will not happen without a great deal of ongoing support, guidance and hard work on the part of school leaders, but we are working to build systems and support structures that will allow us to exercise as much quality control 

as possible. 

To this end, we are creating an on-line reporting platform so that principals 

across the state will be able to enter observation scores in real time, and we will 

be able to compile data at the school, district and state level. This means that in 
14 

November, for example, we would be able to see through our state system that the 

average observation score in County X is a 3.2, while the average observation score 

in County Y is a 4.2. If the different levels of ratings do not correspond with 

achievement scores in the district—meaning that if County Y is not significantly 

outperforming County X on its achievement and value-added scores—we will reasonably assume that the counties are applying difference standards, despite our training and support. We then will be able to engage in site visits, observations, and renorming of the observers and observation scores. In essence, we need to make sure 

to the extent possible that districts across the state are holding themselves to the 

same bar. 

For the quantitative piece, we are proceeding this year with the current system 

while we field-test and explore additional options for the 2012-13 school year. The 

biggest current critique is from teachers in the untested subjects and grade levels. 

Many feel that it is unfair to be assessed through school-wide value-added scores. 

Here is how we are thinking about that piece. 

First, this year we are working with teams of educators and experts to field-test 

several alternative assessments across multiple fields. For the following school year, 

we would like to offer districts—at their discretion—the ability to use demonstrated 

high-quality assessments. Some districts may choose to use these assessments, both 

because of the assistance in identifying student needs and also for individualizing 

teacher value. Some districts may continue to believe that school-wide data facilitates team-building and helps create a sense of collective accountability for results. 

I will share my own belief on this, which stems in part from my experiences as 

a former first and second grade teacher. I believe that for academic subjects and 

grades—for instance, first grade or secondary foreign languages—we should aspire 

to use assessments that capture teachers’ individual impact on student growth. For 

many subjects, though,—for instance art and music—it is appropriate to use schoolwide value-added data. I do not think we should test kids in every single class. Furthermore, teachers who touch large numbers of students in a school have a schoolwide impact, not just on reading and math but also on building the school culture 

that plays a large role in outcomes. As one music teacher shared with me at a 

roundtable, ‘‘When there are budget cuts that eliminate music positions, we are the 

first people to step up and talk about our school-wide impact.’’ 

An additional concern is that the value-added scores will disadvantage teachers 

who work in the highest-need schools and classrooms. Our evidence does not support this claim. There are wide disparities in value-added data among districts and 

schools, and some suburban schools with high absolute achievement scores nonetheless have lower value-added scores. Additionally, as an alumnus of Teach For America, I am proud to note that in our assessment of teacher providers, teachers from 

Teach For America and Vanderbilt outperformed teachers from every other pathway 

on value-added scores. Teach For America teachers, of course, teach in the highest 

need classrooms in the state. 

A third complaint involves the volatility of value-added scores. Some experts believe that value-added scores waver too much from year to year. We believe that 

value-added scores, as used by the state over a period of years, are meaningful indicators of annual progress. To ensure the fairest system, though, we are going to use 

three-year rolling value-added scores for teachers for their individual assessments 

where possible. For instance, a teacher who has taught at least three consecutive 

years will be scored through the average of those years rather than simply through 

the last year. For teachers with only two years of scores, we will use the two-year 

average, and for teachers with one year, that will constitute the score for their assessments. 

One additional challenge is that there are a surprising number of one-off situations that impact the ability to use quantitative data. We have teachers who teach 

multiple subjects across multiple schools, particularly in remote areas, and it becomes ever more difficult to isolate the impact. We have teachers who teach in alternative settings, where students are sent to them because of behavior problems but 

may only be in their class for a period of a few weeks. 

These are real issues, and we care about doing the best job we can in these situations. I feel strongly, however, that we cannot let the outlier examples dictate policy 

for the vast majority of teachers. We are likely to read many newspaper stories this 

year in Tennessee that focus on anecdotes about individual teachers who do not fit 

perfectly within our evaluation framework. We have to strike the right balance of 

working to improve the evaluation tools for those teachers, while remaining focused 

on what I believe is a strong system for the vast majority of teachers. 

I want to touch quickly on the implication of the evaluation system for teachers. 

Essentially, what are the stakes? 
15 

First, Tennessee’s evaluation law states clearly that ‘‘evaluations shall be considered in personnel decisions.’’ This simple directive is critical to school district policy 

moving forward. LIFO—the pernicious system of laying off the youngest teachers 

first, regardless of how good they are—cannot be used any more. Schools must take 

the evaluations into consideration. 

Second, under Governor Haslam’s leadership, Tennessee passed landmark tenure 

legislation this year. Previously, teachers were granted tenure after three years, and 

virtually every teacher got it. It was a virtual rubber stamp. Moving forward, teachers are eligible for tenure after a minimum of five years and only if they score a 

4 or a 5 on the evaluation for their most recent two years of teaching. Additionally, 

teachers who gain tenure under the new system will lose their tenure if they are 

rated a 1 or a 2 for two consecutive years. 

I believe this legislation will be groundbreaking for Tennessee over the coming 

decades. If there is any place for tenure in K to 12 education, it must be tied to 

teacher effectiveness, not just initially but in an ongoing way. 

Let me close with some broad thoughts based on our experience in Tennessee. 

First, there is no perfect evaluation system. It doesn’t exist and we should stop pretending that the goal is perfection. Second, a good evaluation system must have 

multiple measures. It must have both a tie to quantitative student achievement 

growth, and it must have multiple means of assessing a teacher, qualitatively. 

Third, there should be a continuous improvement cycle for the system itself. We are 

going to review our system every year, make changes based on feedback from teachers and administrators, and keep making it better. 

Additionally, while I have focused on our statewide TAP rubric for observation 

today, we have approved three alternative observation systems that several districts 

will use this year. One system is built around ten or more short observations of 5- 

10 minutes each. Another, through the work of the Gates Foundation in Memphis, 

uses multiple tools including student surveys. We approved these models precisely 

because we don’t think we have designed a perfect system and because we do think 

we should have multiple systems in place that we can study and learn from. 

Finally, from my experiences to date in Tennessee, I strongly believe that at some 

point, states simply have to stop planning and dive in to do this work. I know there 

are many states that continue to kick implementation one year farther down the 

road. This seems to be rooted in the futile belief that states will perfect the system 

before rollout, or that opponents of the system will be assuaged by delay. Neither 

is true. At some point, states and districts have to actually implement the system, 

and I am enormously proud that Tennessee is implementing the system this year, 

without giving in to calls for further delay. 

Thank you again for the opportunity to present on behalf of my boss, Governor 

Haslam, and the state department of education of Tennessee. I look forward to fielding questions on this important topic. 

Chairman KLINE. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. Boasberg, you are recognized. 

STATEMENT OF TOM BOASBERG, SUPERINTENDENT, 

DENVER PUBLIC SCHOOLS 

Mr. BOASBERG. Great. Thank you very much, Chairman Kline 

and Ranking Member Miller. 

I certainly want to also thank Senator Bennet for his kind introduction. Certainly the work that Michael led as superintendent to 

Denver Public Schools and his focus on attracting and developing 

and retaining great teachers and high-quality instruction for all 

and his relentless can-do spirit and optimism really helped transform the Denver Public Schools. 

So we have a slide deck for you today where we are focusing on 

a couple slides. And if we can go to the first slide in the deck, it 

really says, why are we doing this? Why is our program we call 

LEAP, Leading Effective Academic Practice, the number one priority of the district? 

And it is precisely because having a great teacher in every classroom is the most important thing in driving student achievement 
16 

and helping close the achievement gaps we have in Denver, providing equity for every one of our students so that we can create 

a much stronger economic and civic future for the Denver community. 

Next slide, please. 

We have collaborated very, very closely with our teachers to 

jointly spell out what excellence in teaching across its many dimensions means, through focus groups, through joint principal and 

teacher design teams. And I certainly want to recognize the leadership of our teachers’ association president, Henry Roman, for his 

role in helping lead this process. 

We piloted our new system this last spring in 16 of our schools 

with over 500 teachers, got a very strong response from our teachers, and in May teachers at each one of our schools had the chance 

to vote whether this school year, beginning next month, to use the 

system. And I am pleased to say that teachers in over 95 percent 

of our schools have chosen to do so. 

Next slide, please. 

The next slide represents our framework for effective teaching, 

the observation tool that principals and peer observers use to observe and give feedback to teachers about their classroom instruction. There are 21 specific indicators on the framework that fall 

into eight specific expectations around positive classroom culture 

and climate, effective classroom management, standards-based 

goals, high-impact instructional moves, differentiation, masterful 

content knowledge, academic language development, and 21st century skills. 

You will note a particular emphasis on the importance of our 

English language learners, who make up over 40 percent of the district students. One reason we chose to develop our own framework 

and rubric was we felt the national available frameworks did not 

have an adequate focus on English language learners. 

And you will also note the focus on the key skills we know our 

students need to develop to be successful in this century’s economy: 

critical thinking, creativity, academic language, collaboration, and 

classroom leadership among them. 

Slide five, the next slide, shows how our teachers, 500 teachers 

in the pilot have felt. Over 80 percent of them have felt that they 

got feedback that was actually helping them improve their classroom instruction, more than two times under our previous system. 

And we know how extraordinarily challenging and sophisticated 

quality teaching is and how important coaching and feedback is to 

teachers to develop their professional craft. 

Next slide, please. 

This slide then begins to show one of the elements on the framework, specifically how a teacher motivates students to learn, to 

take academic risks, and demonstrate classroom leadership and 

really try and have very concrete and specific examples of what excellent practice is to give teachers that specificity and to help 

coaches provide coaching and feedback to our teachers. 

Next slide. 

This slide looks at that same indicator, motivating students to 

learn, take academic risks, and demonstrate classroom leadership 

and looks at student behaviors. And one of the things that we care 
17 

most about our framework is that, for each of the elements, we not 

look only at the behaviors of the teacher but what is going on in 

the classroom. What impact is that having on students in the classroom? Because if it is not happening among students, then it is not 

happening. That clearly is the measure of effective instruction, is 

how students are reacting. So this looks very specifically and concretely at how students are doing in the classroom and tries to 

then distinguish what is, for example, very effective practice. 

When you look at something like the first bullet, almost all of the 

students begin work immediately after tasks are assigned and continue on task throughout their work time, versus approaching, 

which is that most students begin working on tasks after assigned, 

and some are struggling with those tasks. 

Next slide. 

Another example of this is on providing opportunities for creativity/innovation, critical thinking, and problem solving. Again, 

both the teacher behaviors and the student behaviors. 

Next slide, please. 

Just as students, so do adult learners need to focus on critical 

areas of development. So we make sure that in our framework each 

individual teacher picks one area of focus, each school picks a particular area of focus for focus on school-wide so all the professional 

development in that school is focused in the line towards the 

growth of the teachers throughout that building in that particular 

area. 

Go through the next two slides, if you would, which are about 

professional development, videos that we have on our website that 

demonstrate excellence in practice across each of the 21 indicators, 

excellent DPS teachers demonstrating that practice. 

This slide, part of our system also is feedback from students on 

questions that have been shown to be correlated with growth and 

student achievement. This is one of the elements of our program 

as well. 

The next and last slide, please. 

And then overall, summing up, overall, the teacher’s assessment 

is based on a whole series of multiple measures. As required by 

State law, half of the assessment is based on multiple measures of 

growth in student achievement. And we also have the principal and 

peer observations, we have the professional contributions to team 

and to school, and we have the student perception data. So we believe very strongly in multiple and balanced measures of teachers, 

with a real focus on feedback and coaching and professional development of the professional skills of our teachers. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Mr. Boasberg follows:] 

Prepared Statement of Thomas Boasberg, Superintendent, 

School District No. 1, City and County of Denver 

Good Morning Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee. I would like to 

thank you for this opportunity to provide input regarding the critical issue of educator effectiveness. I am Tom Boasberg, Superintendent of Denver Public Schools. I 

have been Superintendent since January, 2009. 

Below we detail the purpose of our Leading Effective Academic Practice system 

(LEAP), the collaborative process used to develop LEAP, the Framework for Excellent Teaching, and the set of professional develop supports for our teachers that are 

aligned with LEAP. 
18 

Purpose of Leading Effective Academic Practice System (LEAP) 

Overview: The Denver Plan 

The 2010 Denver Plan lays out the DPS vision and the course we are embarking 

on to achieve our goals. It states the district’s committed to having a highly effective 

teacher in every classroom and building strategies to support this commitment. 

The Empowering Excellent Educators work, including LEAP, focuses on two strategies within the Denver Plan: 

1. GREAT PEOPLE TO DRIVE BETTER OUTCOMES FOR STUDENTS: Development of a multiple-measure teacher evaluation and feedback system that meaningfully differentiates the performance of teachers. 

2. FOCUS ON THE INSTRUCTIONAL CORE: Create conditions to ensure educator effectiveness. This will require us to develop a shared definition of effective 

teaching (DPS Framework for Effective Teaching); do more to support teachers in 

becoming effective teachers; and continue to develop principals to be effective leaders. 

The Need for Reform: 

Despite the progress that we have made as a district, we must face the sobering 

reality: • Too few DPS students are proficient on the state’s reading, mathematics and 

writing measures. • Not enough of our students are graduating from high school. 

• In a district where a majority of our students are of color—58% Latino and 14% 

African American—and 73% of all students are FRL, an unacceptable achievement 

gap persists between our African-American and Latino students and their Anglo and 

Asian-American counterparts. 

While our growth confirms that we are on the right track, we acknowledge that 

we must significantly accelerate our rate of improvement and put far more of our 

students on the path to graduation and success in college and careers. 

Study after study has made clear that the most important factor in closing the 

achievement gap is the quality of teaching. Our students deserve our best and we 

need to ensure that all students have great teachers. 

Ready for Reform: 

It is time to accelerate our reforms, to sharpen the focus on student achievement 

and classroom excellence. 

A report released in August 2010 by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute recognized 

Denver as the 4th best city in the country for cultivating a healthy environment for 

school reform to flourish. 

The Council of the Great City Schools, a national organization of 67 of the nation’s largest urban school districts, stressed in its 2009 evaluation of DPS that our 

district’s vision for reform is ‘‘one of the most promising and comprehensive in the 

nation.’’ The council further noted, ‘‘The architecture of these reforms—instructional, financial, and human capital—is among the most seamlessly conceived in all 

of urban education in the United States.’’ 

Denver Public Schools has made steady strides in the past few years. Our momentum is strong and we need to capitalize on it now. Investing in teachers is one of 

the critical ingredients to school reform in Denver. Essential to our reform strategy 

is empowering educators with meaningful feedback to enhance their instruction and 

maximize their impact on student achievement. 

Empowering Excellent Educators: Elevating the Teaching Profession 

Empowering Excellent Educators is a comprehensive set of initiatives rooted in 

a commitment to consistently develop, recognize, reward, recruit and retain great 

teachers and principals. LEAP is part of DPS’s commitment to Empowering Excellent Educators. 

REWARD AND RETAIN

• Foster a supporting environment for all DPS teachers to grow professionally 

• Recognize and reward our best teachers as an invaluable resource 

• Provide opportunities for leadership and advancement for highly effective teachers 

• Build sustainable training structures 

• Provide coaching to new teachers 

RECRUITMENT

• Attract excellent new and experienced teachers 
19 

• Recruit diverse teachers who reflect our diverse student population • Complete early hiring cycles to secure the best available talent • Provide multiple pathways into teaching including Denver Teacher Residency 

(DTR) • Train our principals on how to successfully identify and onboard new teachers 

that fit their school culture 

EVALUATION

• Provide evaluations that are transparent, objective and complete • Use multiple measures, including peer observation and student achievement 

data • Link to differentiated professional development 

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND SUPPORT

• Provide meaningful professional development • Link professional development to identified needs • Create a structure of feedback and support • Provide teachers with the online tools and resources they need for success, including online assessment tools and easily accessible curricular resources 

Every component of Empowering Excellent Educators is built on the respect for 

the central role of educators in raising student achievement in the district. Our hope 

is that Empowering Excellent Educators will elevate the teaching profession within 

DPS, in our community and shine a national spotlight on the far-reaching and profound impact we know teachers have on their students. 

Collaborative process used to develop LEAP 

Collaboration: 

From the planning stage and throughout development, DPS and DCTA have 

worked collaboratively. DPS and DCTA recognize that a successful Framework for 

Effective Teaching and the supporting evaluation system, LEAP, must be informed 

by the ideas and experiences of actual practitioners. 

DPS and DCTA have worked together to organize various engagement groups: 

• Steering Committee: An oversight committee for Empowering Excellent Educators responsible for ongoing strategic direction and decision making. Members of 

the group: 

Tom Boasberg—DPS Superintendent 

Susana Cordova—DPS Chief Academic Officer 

Shayne Spalten—DPS Chief Human Resources Officer 

Henry Roman—DCTA President 

Carolyn Crowder—DCTA 

• Professional Practices Work Group: A group comprised of DPS employees, 

DCTA members, and outside experts that act as an advisory board to the LEAP 

steering committee, project leadership team, and design teams. 

• Focus Groups: Conducted by a third party and used throughout the development of LEAP and the DPS Framework for Effective Teaching to incorporate teacher and principal voice. 

• Design Teams: Groups of teachers and principals within DPS that were formed 

to incorporate teacher and principal voice into the new DPS Framework for Effective 

Teaching and LEAP. The five Design Teams include: Principal Effectiveness, Teacher Effectiveness, Peer Observation, Student Assessment and Outcomes, and Professional Development. 

• LEAP Project Leadership Team: DPS staff dedicated to the development of 

LEAP and the DPS Framework for Effective Teaching. The team includes a fulltime DCTA Liaison who works closely with the LEAP team and brings DCTA perspective on a daily basis. 

Focus Group Findings: 

Over a three week period in April 2010 approximately 225 principals, teachers, 

district staff, and students participated and shared their ideas in focus groups facilitated by a neutral third party. 

The purpose of the focus groups was two-fold: 

1. DPS and DCTA wanted to gather the best information possible from all stakeholders about what is working within the current system, what is most in need of 

repair, and what would be necessary to build a more ideal teacher performance assessment system. 

2. The focus groups would serve as an important step in a continuous improvement cycle that will seek out input, share that input with Design Teams, and check 
20 

back to ensure the designs are in alignment with the specifications outlined by focus 

group participants. 

The Focus Groups resulted in a set of Core Values that have been used to guide 

the development of the DPS Framework for Effective Teaching and LEAP. 

FOCUS GROUP CORE VALUES

• Rooted in Professional Expertise 

The definition of effective teaching needs to be based on the best research and 

is co-constructed by teachers themselves. Administrators and other evaluators must 

have the background and expertise necessary to accurately and fairly assess the 

quality of the teaching they are charged with observing. 

• Multiple Sources of Data 

The system of assessment should bring together various points of data (including 

principal observation, peer observation, student growth, self-reflection, and other information) to identify areas of strength and to set clear, specific targets for growth. 

• Continuous Feedback 

The system should provide frequent and ongoing feedback about practice, rather 

than one-shot data points. Constructive feedback is the lifeblood of improvement, 

providing information about areas of strength and areas for growth, and it should 

flow through all aspects of the system to ensure each element—from classroom practice to professional development—is achieving the desired results. 

• Consistency with Flexibility 

The system should set clear standards of effective practice and apply them faithfully and fairly across the district, but allow enough flexibility to set goals for improvement and professional development based on the levels of experience and 

unique needs of each educator. 

• Accountability 

While the system should aspire to help everyone improve their practice, it must 

also distinguish between various levels of performance, and hold people accountable 

for reasonable results. Improvement plans must be followed and have consequences. 

The measurement system should change from a binary ‘‘satisfactory/unsatisfactory’’ 

to a continuum of performance with specifically defined levels of proficiency. 

• A Culture of Learning 

The system must support and encourage learning and innovation at all levels— 

in students, in educators, and in administrators—instead of being punitive or just 

rewarding compliance. Growth must be the end-game for all members of the system. 

The district as a whole, as well as individual schools, must be intentional about fostering a culture that supports everyone to learn. 

• Reward Effectiveness 

The system should reward effectiveness, linking financial rewards to the evaluation system as well as non financial rewards such as recognition and unique professional opportunities. It should reward effectiveness regardless of years of experience. 

Design Teams: 

After the initial focus groups were held, the next step in teacher and principal 

engagment was to form five Design Teams in the spring of 2010. 

1. Teacher Effectiveness 

2. Principal Effectiveness 

3. Peer Observations 

4. Professional Development 

5. Student Assessments and Outcomes 

The five Design Teams worked many hours during the summer and fall of 2010. 

They applied the Core Values from the focus groups in addition to pertinent national research and made recommendations on the specific components of the new 

LEAP system as well as the development of the DPS Framework for Effective 

Teaching. The passion and dedication they put into their work was inspiring. As one 

Design Team member states: 

‘‘Teachers and administrators working together to define, describe and expect effective teaching will help ensure that every child has an excellent teacher in their classroom.’’ 

LA DAWN BAITY, 

Principal, Steck Elementary School. 

Spring 2011 Pilot: 

The next step in teacher and principal involvement. * * * 

From the start, this effort has been collaborative and informed by the teachers 

and principals who will ultimately be supported by the new system. From focus 
21 

groups to Design Teams to the spring 2011 LEAP pilot * * * teacher and principal 

voice has been a key element of the development process. 

The spring 2011 LEAP pilot schools experienced various components of LEAP and 

provided their input to help guide improvements to the system prior to the districtwide pilot in 2011-12. 

LEAP Pilot: January–May 2011 

Sixteen schools piloted components of LEAP from January—May 2011. Teachers 

and principals in these schools were the first to experience the system. In many 

ways they were the architects of LEAP as their feedback guided improvements to 

the system in preparation for the district-wide pilot beginning in August 2011. 

DPS’s approach of teacher and principal involvement is somewhat unique: it ensures that our new evaluation tool will be informed by teachers and principals within the district from inception through rollout. 

FRAMEWORK FOR EXCELLENT TEACHING 

Overview: The foundation * * * 

The DPS Framework for Effective Teaching serves as the foundation for the Empowering Excellent Educators work in DPS. It provides teachers and principals 

with: • A shared understanding of effective teaching in DPS • A foundation upon which teachers can reflect and perfect their craft • Observation tool used in LEAP, the new teacher evaluation system 

Effective teaching = success with kids. The DPS Framework for Effective Teaching captures the potential of teaching actions to impact student learning in classrooms across Denver. 

The framework currently includes standards for measuring the effectiveness of 

teachers in the classroom (onstage domains). We are in the process of building out 

the standards for rating teachers’ effectiveness outside of the classroom (offstage domains). 

4 DOMAINS IN THE DPS FRAMEWORK FOR EFFECTIVE TEACHING

Onstage Domains 

Offstage Domains 

• Learning Environment • Planning & Preparation • Instruction • Professionalism 

With the DPS Framework for Effective Teaching, performance ratings move from 

a binary system of ‘‘satisfactory’’ and ‘‘unsatisfactory’’ to a continuum of performance 

with four levels of effectiveness and seven rating categories: • Not Meeting (1-2) • Approaching (3-4) • Effective (5-6) • Distinguished (7) 

Multiple ratings provide the opportunity to identify areas of strength as well as 

growth opportunities. Teachers are able to target their professional development to 

their growth areas. All teachers, whether new to the profession or veteran teachers, 

can continue to grow professionally and be even better for their students. 

Development: Initial Development 

Some of the most significant and challenging Design Team work was that of the 

Teacher Effectiveness Design Team. When discussing the framework to be used in 

DPS, the Design Team placed high priority on several aspects: • ELL-focused, urban lens 

• Teacher AND student behaviors 

• Meaningfully differentiated performance of teachers 

• Comprehensive but manageable 

The Design Team looked at various national frameworks and observation tools: 

• Charlotte Danielson’s Framework of Effective Teaching 

• Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS) 

• Teacher Advancement Program (TAP) 

• Quality Urban Classrooms (QUC) 

• The Denver Teacher Residency Framework for Educational Equity 

In the end, the Design Team recommended that DPS develop our own framework 

based on the best components of each tool, aligned to their specific understanding 

of teacher effectiveness in DPS, and based on the 4 domains of Learning Environment; Instruction; Planning and Preparation; and Professionalism. 
22 

The resulting DPS Framework for Effective Teaching is a homegrown, practitioner-designed tool that pulls from research-based tools used locally and nationally. 

FRAMEWORK REFINEMENT

The DPS Framework for Effective Teaching was the foundational tool used in over 

1400 classroom observations and feedback conversations during the spring 2011 

LEAP pilot. DPS also aligned all professional development offerings to the Framework making it the core of personal reflection as well as professional growth. 

Teachers and principals in the 16 pilot schools provided extensive feedback on the 

Framework which was carefully assessed by the LEAP project team and McREL, 

a third-party program evaluator. 

In May/June 2011, the DPS Framework for Effective Teaching was revised based 

on pilot feedback, alignment to Common Core State Standards, and alignment to 

the DPS English Language Acquisition program. 

The most noticeable change to the Framework was the addition of three new indicators focused on English Language Acquisition: two of these indicators will be observed in ELA-E and ELA-S classrooms and the third will be observed in ELA-S 

classrooms. 

The new indicators emphasize and support effective practice for English Language 

Learners across the district, which constitute more than 40% of our student population and apply to over 2600 designated ELA-E and ELA-S teachers. 

The revised Framework for Effective Teaching will be used in the 2011-12 LEAP 

pilot in over 120 DPS schools. Feedback from educators across the district during 

the pilot year will inform future improvements. 

View the Framework: DPS Framework Overview for Effective Teaching 2011- 

12 

ALIGNING SUPPORT

DPS is working to create a variety of different types of high quality professional 

development that are aligned to the DPS Framework for Effective Teaching. Teachers are able to access targeted support which enables them to refine their craft and 

continue to grow professionally. 

For example, video exemplars of effective instructional practice aligned to each indicator of the Framework are currently being captured and uploaded in the LEAP 

section of the DPS Online Learning Center (Moodle). 

A screen shot showing examples of support offerings available on the DPS Online 

Learning Center can be seen below. 

LEAP System and professional development supports 

Overview: The multiple measures in LEAP 

The district and the DCTA have worked in collaboration with DPS teachers and 

school leaders to develop a new teacher performance assessment system. Through 

their work on Design Teams, teachers and principals applied the guiding principles 

from the focus groups to develop recommendations for a meaningful system of observation, feedback, support and evaluation for teachers. This is what we now call 

LEAP—Leading Effective Academic Practice. 

LEAP provides teachers with additional feedback and support so they can continue to learn and grow professionally. Teachers want to be the best they can be 

for their students and our students deserve nothing less than GREAT teachers. 

Multiple measures 

Student Outcomes: All Students are Capable of Learning and Growing 

This component of LEAP is still in development and will not be part of the LEAP 

pilot. 

When taken into account with other measures of teacher performance, looking at 

student outcomes is a way to measure the direct impact of a teacher on student 

achievement. Student outcomes provide a full picture of the learning that results 

from teacher actions over the course of a year. 

When fully developed, Student Outcomes will comprise 50% of a teacher’s evaluation. We will be using multiple measures of student performance data rather than 

a single data source and are committed to using, in as many instances as possible, 

assessments that are already being used to inform instructional practice. 

As we continue to develop the Student Outcomes aspect of LEAP, we are considering the following: 
23 

STUDENT ASSESSMENT CRITERIA

1. Multiple sources of data 

2. Growth 

3. Summative—external and internal 

4. Formative—consistent and accurate scoring across district 

5. Alignment to standards, scope, and sequence 

6. Increased emphasis on objective measures 

7. English and Spanish options 

8. School / team accountability 

9. Transparent formula 

10. Timeliness in administration and results 

Principal Observation: Feedback From Your School Leader 

The Principal Observation measure in LEAP is fully developed and in-scope for 

the LEAP pilot. 

Historically, principals have played an important role in evaluating and supporting teachers in their schools. This does not change with LEAP. Observation and 

feedback provided by school principals remain an important aspect of teacher evaluation. With LEAP: • Principals are receiving extensive training on the DPS Framework for Effective 

Teaching, consistent rating (inter-rater reliability), and giving meaningful feedback. • Principals will conduct classroom observations using the DPS Framework for 

Effective Teaching. Teachers will receive two principal observations during the 

2011-12 LEAP pilot. • Principals will provide teachers with post observation feedback, including insight on areas of strength as well as growth opportunities. Teachers will use this 

feedback to select from a variety of differentiated professional development offerings, all aligned to the Framework for Effective Teaching. 

Peer Observation: Third-Party Feedback With First-Hand Knowledge 

Peer Observation is part of the LEAP system because there is tremendous value 

in teachers receiving honest, open feedback from a peer or colleague who has a similar content expertise. 

The Peer Observer role is a new position to DPS but one that has been used effectively in school districts across the country for a number of years. Peer Observers 

are fellow teachers who have been hired specifically for this role because they are 

recognized for their experience and expertise in content, classroom instruction, student achievement, and best practices. 

Peer Observers will be matched as closely as possible to the content or grade level 

of the teacher they are observing so they can provide feedback and support that is 

specific and relevant. Peer Observers will provide a third-party, outside perspective 

combined with first hand experience with the realities of teaching. 

IN RELATION TO PRINCIPAL OBSERVATION

• Principals and Peer Observers will both use the DPS Framework for Effective 

Teaching when gathering observation data and will also use the same feedback protocol to ensure consistency. • Both the principal and peer observations will provide targeted feedback about 

how teachers are performing against the standards in the Framework for Effective 

Teaching and will help promote teacher growth and development. • Peer observation is not in isolation from observations done with the principal, 

but simply adds data points upon which the principal and teacher can review to 

make decisions about next steps with practice. • Peer observation allows for more opportunities for teachers to receive feedback. 

Collaborative Professionalism: A Teacher’s Contributions to Their Team and 

School 

This component of LEAP was in development during the spring 2011 LEAP pilot. 

It will be ready for the 2011-12 district-wide LEAP pilot. 

Professional Collaboration represents the offstage domains—what a teacher does 

outside of the classroom that helps determine their effectiveness—of the DPS 

Framework for Effective Teaching. 

Examples include: 

• Maintaining student records (student progress) • Communicating with families 

• Self-accountability for student growth 

• Reflection 

• PLCs 
24 

• Teacher leadership 

• Collaboration with colleagues 

• Collaboration with community 

• Pursuing opportunities for professional growth 

• Content & pedagogical knowledge 

• Knowledge of students 

• Identifying key outcomes 

• Knowledge of resources/materials 

• Integrating materials, resources, tools, technology 

• Designing coherent instruction 

• Creating student assessments 

• Use of data in planning 

Student Perception: Students Know When They Have A Great Teacher * * * 

This component of LEAP was introduced to the spring 2011 LEAP pilot schools 

in April. 

Student Perception Surveys are important because they allow student voice to be 

part of the evaluation process. 

DPS is one of seven districts participating in a national research study called 

Measures of Effective Teaching (MET) project. The research findings from the MET 

project are informing our approach to this component of LEAP because MET includes a Student Perception Survey. Initial MET findings (released in December, 

2010) indicate that: 

• The average student knows effective teaching when he/she experiences it. 

• Student perceptions can help identify effective teachers and point to specific aspects of teacher practice needing improvement. 

• Valid teacher feedback need not be limited to test scores alone. 

• By combining different sources of data, it is possible to provide diagnostic, targeted feedback to teachers who are eager to improve. 

DPS will be using research-based student perception surveys developed by Tripod. 

More on Tripod student-perception surveys: 

• Developed by Harvard Professor Ron Ferguson 

• The framework emphasizes an instructional ‘‘tripod’’ of content knowledge, pedagogical skill and relationships 

• Tripod surveys have been used in hundreds of schools and thousands of classrooms in the U.S. and abroad, as well as in the recent MET study 

• Includes measures of teacher effectiveness and student engagement, from the 

student perspective 

Professional Development Alignment: Balancing Support with Accountability 

DPS is dedicated to building a path that helps develop new teachers, ensures that 

all teachers continue to grow professionally, and rewards and recognizes great 

teachers throughout their careers. 

LEAP helps teachers recognize areas of strength in their teaching practice and 

also helps identify growth opportunities. Once growth opportunities are identified, 

teachers are able to access differentiated professional development offerings which 

are aligned to the Framework for Effective Teaching. DPS is creating a variety of 

different types of high quality professional development to ensure teachers can access the types that are most relevant to their individual needs and interests. 

Teachers and principals are able to work together to identify targeted professional 

development resources and focus a teacher’s development on those opportunities 

that will have the most direct impact on a teacher’s practice and student learning. 
25 
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27 
28 
29 
30 
31 

Chairman KLINE. Thank you, Mr. Boasberg. 

Mr. Cicarella, you are recognized. 
32 

STATEMENT OF DAVID CICARELLA, PRESIDENT, 

NEW HAVEN FEDERATION OF TEACHERS 

Mr. CICARELLA. Yes. Thank you. 

My name is David Cicarella. I am the president of the New 

Haven Federation of Teachers; and on behalf of the NHFT and its 

national federation, the American Federation of Teachers, I want 

to thank you for this opportunity to speak about our collective efforts to improve student learning and strengthen the teaching profession in New Haven. 

Our schools were facing the same challenges as many school districts in the country. This included the need for more meaningful 

parental involvement, comprehensive wraparound services for the 

most at-risk students, and, yes, a better way of evaluating teachers 

and providing them with the ongoing supports they need to do the 

best for their students. 

The situation in New Haven was exacerbated because the relationship between the mayor and the superintendent and the local 

union was often acrimonious. Teachers certainly were not satisfied 

with a system that failed to provide any meaningful supports or 

feedback to help them develop their expertise and maximize their 

capacity to improve student learning. 

We knew there was no way to improve our lowest-performing 

schools without involving teachers. Districts nationwide were looking at how best to improve teaching and learning by incorporating 

a more robust teacher evaluation system. 

In New Haven, the mayor, superintendent, and our local union 

made a decision to work collaboratively through the existing collective bargaining process. We ultimately were able to negotiate a 

contract that, in addition to wages and benefits, would lay the 

groundwork for a breakout model of urban school reform, one that 

values and welcomes teacher voice in all key decisions. 

Now, it is incredibly significant that both the national and State 

representatives from AFT were active partners, and they were completely welcomed by the New Haven School District. The contract 

was hailed in our local media as, quote, ‘‘a first-in-the-nation agreement between a city and a teachers union to work together to 

change the way public schools work.’’ 

I think it is also significant to note that the contract was ratified 

overwhelmingly by our members by a vote of 855 to 42. The new 

contract was ushered in with such strong support because the process that led up to its passage was very collaborative and it valued 

input from the teachers about the district’s reform plans. Because 

the district involved the teachers in such a meaningful way, there 

was a tremendous amount of buy-in from the teachers. 

One of the reform initiatives we adopted was a new system for 

evaluating our teachers. The plan included multiple measures of 

professional performance and real supports tied to professional development. Now, what is key here is that we didn’t just build a 

teacher evaluation plan that acts as a sorting mechanism to tell us 

who is doing a good job and who is facing difficulty. Instead, we 

created a system that focuses on the continuous support and development of all teachers, those struggling and those doing a good job. 

All teachers benefit from a goal-setting conference in the beginning 

of the year and at least two evaluation and development con-
33 

ferences during the course of the year, with additional conferences 

provided for teachers identified as needing improvement. 

The annual goals that are drawn up in these conferences center 

on the three components of our teacher evaluation plan: student 

learning, absolutely; teacher instructional practice; and professional values. Every element in the evaluation is mutually agreed 

upon; and when it comes to indicators of student progress, the 

teachers and evaluators are encouraged to use multiple measures 

of assessment that include standardized State tests, district assessments, student portfolio work, and teacher-developed assessments. 

Instead of instituting top-down reforms with no teacher input, we 

were able to utilize the collective bargaining process to ensure that 

teachers are heard and respected. Collective bargaining is much 

more than a process to ensure workplace fairness and give workers 

a voice in their jobs. It is a tool that the teachers and school districts can use to drive real reforms aimed at improving both teaching and learning. 

We are just finishing the first year of the implementation of our 

new plan. From the outset, we have collaborated on everything— 

not always agreed, but certainly collaborated. 

The commitment to work together has led to many positive outcomes, not the least of which is increased community support. 

Under the New Haven Promise program, funded in part by Yale 

University, eligible students graduating from every New Haven 

high school will receive full tuition to a public college or university 

in Connecticut. 

In New Haven, teachers have no problem being held accountable 

or sharing responsibility, as long as we are provided with an 

agreed-upon, transparent set of standards and a process for evaluation that includes student achievement, classroom practice, and 

professional values. Our collaborative work in New Haven has created a professional culture whereby teachers and administrators 

work side by side, channeling their energies to create a system that 

puts student learning front and center. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Mr. Cicarella follows:] 

Prepared Statement of David Cicarella, President, 

New Haven Federation of Teachers 

Good morning Chairman Kline, Ranking Member Miller and members of the committee. My name is David Cicarella, and I am the president of the New Haven Federation of Teachers (NHFT), an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers 

(AFT). The NHFT represents more than 1,600 teachers. 

Thank you for this opportunity to speak about our collective efforts in New 

Haven, Conn., to improve student learning and strengthen the teaching profession 

through, in part, our development of a comprehensive teacher support and evaluation system in the district. 

New Haven schools were facing the same challenges many school districts in the 

country are facing today: Many of our students were not reaching their potential. 

As in all cases, a variety of factors contributed to that situation, including the need 

for more meaningful parental involvement, comprehensive wraparound services for 

the most at-risk students and, yes, a better way of evaluating teachers and providing them with the ongoing supports they need to do the best for their students. 

The situation was exacerbated because the relationship between the mayor and superintendent and our local union was often acrimonious, and was characterized by 

distrust and disrespect on both sides. 

Teachers certainly were not satisfied with the status quo: a system that failed to 

provide any meaningful supports or feedback to help them develop their expertise 
34 

and maximize their capacity to improve student learning. New Haven did not have 

in place processes for turning around low-performing schools or for supporting and 

evaluating teachers. We knew there was no way to improve our lowest-performing 

schools without involving teachers and giving them needed supports. 

However, there were few good models that provided guidance. Districts nationwide were looking at how best to improve teaching and learning by incorporating 

a more robust teacher evaluation system as part of that strategy. In New Haven, 

the mayor, superintendent and our local union made a decision to work collaboratively—through the existing collective bargaining process. Keeping collaboration 

and the need for teacher input in mind, the NHFT negotiating team took an aggressive position on evaluation (including the need for teacher involvement and multiple 

measures of student achievement), turnaround schools and other thorny issues in 

order to shape the agenda and drive the final product toward solutions that are good 

for kids and fair for teachers. 

We incorporated the resources and expertise of our national union, the AFT, and 

its affiliate locals. We ultimately were able to negotiate a contract that, in addition 

to wages and benefits, would lay the groundwork for a breakout model of urban 

school reform—one that values and welcomes teacher voice in all key decisions. It 

is incredibly significant that both the national and state representatives from AFT 

were active partners and completely welcomed by the New Haven school district 

representatives. 

The contract, which our members ratified by a vote of 855-42, was hailed in the 

local media as ‘‘a first-in-the-nation agreement between a city and a teachers union 

to work together to change the way public schools work.’’ 

One of the reform initiatives we adopted was a new system for evaluating our 

teachers. The plan included multiple measures of professional performance and real 

supports tied to professional development. What is key here is that we did not just 

build a teacher evaluation plan that simply acts as a sorting mechanism to tell us 

who is doing a good job and who is facing difficulty. Instead, we created a system 

that focuses on the continuous support and development of all teachers—those 

struggling and those doing a good job. 

Under the new system, individual teachers and their evaluators meet each fall to 

set personal professional goals. This is the centerpiece of the new evaluation and 

development system—regular, substantive and collegial conferences between each 

teacher and his or her assigned instructional manager. Each teacher now has a single instructional manager who is accountable for that teacher’s evaluation and development. 

The goal of the evaluation and development conferences is to focus teacher performance conversations around student learning, provide comprehensive feedback 

(including all elements of teacher evaluation) to each teacher, and set a defined plan 

of development opportunities for the teacher. These conferences are the anchor of 

the rest of the evaluation and development process, and the foundation of the professional relationship between teacher and instructional manager. All teachers benefit from a goal-setting conference in the beginning of the year and at least two evaluation and development conferences over the course of the year, with additional conferences provided for teachers identified as needing improvement. 

The annual goals that are drawn up in these conferences center on three important areas: 

• Student performance outcomes measured by growth in student learning and attainment of academic goals; 

• Teacher instructional practice in the domains of planning and preparation, 

classroom practice, and reflection and use of data; and 

• Teacher professional values addressing a set of characteristics including professionalism, collegiality and high expectations for student learning. 

Every element in the evaluation is mutually agreed upon, and when it comes to 

indicators of student progress, teachers and evaluators are encouraged to use multiple measures of assessment that include standardized state tests, district assessments (many of which are conducted quarterly as opposed to annually), student 

portfolio work and teacher-developed assessments. All are valuable and provide a 

full, more encompassing measure of student academic growth and achievement. 

The new system ranks teachers on a 1-5 scale: Those receiving a final summative 

rating of 5 will be considered for teacher leadership positions, while those receiving 

a score of 2 or below will be supported with a tailored improvement plan aimed at 

helping them receive a minimum score of 3 (or ‘‘effective’’). Our goal is to have an 

effective teacher in every classroom. 

Our members ratified this contract overwhelmingly for the following reasons. 

First, instead of instituting ‘‘top-down’’ reforms, with no teacher input, we were able 

to utilize the collective bargaining process to ensure that teachers are heard and re-
35 

spected. Collective bargaining is a process that ensures workplace fairness and gives 

workers a voice in their jobs. But it is much more. It is a process that teachers and 

school districts can use to drive real reforms aimed at improving both teaching and 

learning. For teachers in New Haven, instituting the changes in evaluation and giving teachers a greater say in decision-making at the school level means increasing 

their confidence in the system and the supports they need to be effective in the 

classroom. 

We are just finishing the first year of implementation of our new plan and so far, 

so good. We have established a citywide teacher evaluation committee consisting of 

six teachers selected by the union and six administrators selected by the district. 

From the onset, we have collaborated on everything, even these choices. We share 

our selections and allow every committee member to comment on them—all prior 

to making our choices public. The citywide committee met over the course of the entire year to complete the system. Despite the painstaking detail, it is straightforward with little room for ambiguity. 

In addition to the citywide committee, we established a ‘‘working group’’ that allows for every teacher in the district to volunteer to participate and have input into 

the evaluation system. Participating teachers brought their own questions and concerns to the discussion, as well as those from colleagues back in their schools. Principals were trained in the evaluation system over the summer, and teacher representatives were invited to address the initial training. This sent a clear message 

that the evaluation system is very much a joint effort that is supported by all parties. I was invited to address district administrators at their initial training. I was 

warmly received, and it was a positive experience. 

The lessons learned from our experience in New Haven is that teachers have no 

problem being held accountable, or sharing responsibility, as long as all are provided with an agreed-upon, transparent set of standards and a process for evaluation that includes student achievement, classroom practice and teacher professional 

values. 

Our commitment to work together has led to many positive outcomes, not the 

least of which is increased community support. Yale University has made a commitment of $4 million a year for the next four years to pay up to $8,000 annually to 

cover the cost of a student’s enrollment at one of the state’s public colleges or universities, or $2,500 at a private college. Full grants will be given only to students 

who have been in the New Haven Public Schools since kindergarten, and will be 

prorated for those entering later. 

No two school districts in our nation are alike, and I do not pretend to think that 

our plan will work in all districts. However, I do know that most school districts 

do not have good evaluation systems in place—ones that focus like a laser on boosting student performance through a process that prioritizes the continuous support 

and development of their teaching force. 

I cannot stress enough how critically important a valid, reliable, transparent, and 

ongoing teacher development and evaluation system is to the health of our schools 

and our students’ ultimate success. In the absence of such a system, teachers and 

administrators are left to wonder what works and what doesn’t work, or how and 

how best to inform and improve instruction. We need to work collaboratively at all 

levels—from local school districts to Congress and everywhere in between—to establish the conditions that our children need to succeed and our teachers need to teach. 

Chairman KLINE. Thank you, sir. 

Ms. Walsh, you are recognized. 

STATEMENT OF KATE WALSH, PRESIDENT, 

NATIONAL COUNCIL ON TEACHER QUALITY 

Ms. WALSH. Chairman Kline, Ranking Member Miller, and members of the Committee on Education and the Workforce, thank you 

very much for your invitation to participate in this hearing today. 

My name is Kate Walsh, and I am the president of the National 

Council on Teacher Quality. NCTQ is an organization that advocates for a broad range of teacher policy reforms at the federal, 

State, and local levels aimed at increasing the number of effective 

teachers in our schools. 
36 

As Mr. Miller and Mr. Kline both pointed out in their remarks, 

no school-based factor is more important in determining their 

achievement gains than their teachers. Not class size, not access to 

technology, not per student spending, not many of the other things 

that States and school districts pour money into in the name of 

education reform that fail to improve teacher effectiveness. 

In fact, if you look at school spending, while it has increased at 

a rapid rate, very little of these additional resources have been directed at improving teacher quality. Over the last four decades or 

so, per-student inflation-adjusted spending has soared, increasing 

by 2.6 percent a year on average. But it hasn’t been spending on 

teacher pay that has driven that increase. Such spending accounts 

for only a fraction of the annual increase in actual education spending. 

Look at the patterns of spending on resources that are dedicated 

to teachers, such as Title II, for example, the federal funds targeted 

specifically to teacher quality under ESEA. For 2009-2010, the U.S. 

Department of Education reported that the vast majority of the 

funds, that is 42 percent, were used for nonspecified professional 

development activities, with spending to reduce class size coming 

in a close second, at 36 percent. Only 5 percent of those funds were 

reportedly used for promoting teacher quality. Given that research 

shows reductions in class sides are expensive, with little or no systematic relationship to improvements in student achievement, and 

typical professional development programs are poorly designed, it 

is not surprising that Title II, in spite of that annual $3 billion investment, has largely been ineffective at generating the kind of reforms that we all are seeking. 

At the foundation of current efforts to improve teacher quality 

are initiatives to develop fair and reliable teacher evaluation systems that measure teacher effectiveness in the classroom. As of 

2010, we know that 16 States require that teacher evaluations are 

significantly informed by student achievement and growth; and 10 

States, including Tennessee, require that student achievement 

growth is the preponderant criterion in teacher evaluations. That 

is to say that teachers cannot be rated as effective unless they 

meet student achievement or growth targets. 

Already in 2010, we have seen a huge wave of reforms. Four 

States—Colorado, Delaware, Oklahoma, and Rhode Island—have 

put in place State laws or regulations that require evidence of student learning to be the preponderant criterion for granting tenure. 

But I would like to emphasize that these 2010 data are likely 

catching just the beginning of the wave of change. We won’t be surprised if the number of States adopting policies to include student 

achievement and teacher evaluations and alter their tenure policies 

could as much as double by the close of 2011. 

Still, though, the majority of States does not require annual evaluations of all veteran teachers, and most still fail to include any 

objective measures of student learning in the teacher evaluations 

that they do require. In all but a small handful of States, teachers 

are granted tenure with no regard to how effective they are with 

students in the classroom. 

There are many other critical areas that need to be addressed. 

I would like to turn my attention now to the quality of preparation 
37 

of the nation’s teachers. Every year across this country about a 

quarter of a million people enter the teaching profession for the 

first time. Almost all of them are prepared in the Nation’s schools 

of education, which have until now managed to avoid the reform 

spotlight. I am proud to report that NCTQ, in partnership with 

U.S. News & World Report, well known for its ratings of the nation’s higher education institutions, has launched a review of the 

quality of each of the nation’s 1,400 education schools. This has 

never been done before, in spite of many previous efforts, including 

one by the U.S. Congress even 5 years ago. 

Some higher education institutions are welcoming this opportunity to have their programs evaluated, seeing the feedback that 

we will be providing as essential for making long-needed improvements in these programs. But the majority of institutions in the 

United States, unaccustomed to scrutiny, have organized a national 

boycott to block our work, refusing to provide us with the basic 

data that we seek. But we are joined by over 40 foundations across 

the United States who have provided funding for this effort and the 

endorsement of 10 State school chiefs, dozens of school district superintendents, and a host of education advocacy organizations. 

What we are rapidly seeing is an unfortunate battle between 

teacher preparation programs and their own clients in K-12 education. An effective teacher in every classroom is not a far-fetched 

proposition. But a serious effort to cultivate highly effective teachers requires us to take a hard look at current practices and have 

an honest dialogue about the full range of policies needed to transform the profession. We need to attend to how to identify, recruit, 

compensate, reward, and retain more effective teachers, and especially to growing more effective teachers from the start. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Ms. Walsh follows:] 
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48 
49 
50 
51 
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53 

Chairman KLINE. Thank you, Ms. Walsh. 

I want to thank all of the witnesses for your testimony. 

We will move now into questions, and I will start. 

Let me start by saying I think that it is important we heard from 

Mr. Cicarella and from Mr. Boasberg and Mr. Huffman, I think in 

different ways, that the systems being put in place are not only 

useful in evaluating teachers for perhaps retention or promotion or 

pay but giving real-time feedback to the teachers on how they are 

doing, which enables them to do a better job. 

Let me start with Mr. Huffman. When you were trying to develop the value-added metrics for the nontested subjects like art 
54 

and music classes, you said that you used a school-wide—some sort 

of school-wide assessment. Can you tell me how you put that together? How does that work if you are just an art teacher? I don’t 

mean to say ‘‘just an art teacher.’’ Apologies to all the art teachers 

out there. If you are an art teacher, how does that work? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. One thing I have learned on this job is there are 

a lot of art and music teachers, because they come talk to me every 

single time I go speak. 

So, right now, the way it works is for the 35 percent of your score 

that has to be based on student growth, instead of getting an individual assessment—so if you taught fifth grade, for instance, you 

would get a value-added score from the fifth grade assessments— 

in art, you would get the school value-added score. And the school 

value-added score is a composite based on all of the tested subjects 

and grade levels. So if you taught elementary school art, then the 

third, fourth, fifth grades across their subject areas, that all gets 

compiled into a school, that provides a school value-added score. 

And that is what would be used. 

And what we are trying to figure out—I think this is a very hard 

thing to figure out what the right answer is. What we are trying 

to figure out for next year is how we can field test some different 

assessments across different subjects and grade levels that are not 

currently tested and make them available as individualized assessments. 

But I will tell you that my own personal view is I think there 

are situations where it makes absolute sense to try to come up with 

an individual value-added score. So, for instance, in secondary foreign language I think there is a way to assess how much Spanish 

did children learn and to figure out the value-added. 

But I also think that it is appropriate in some cases to use 

school-wide value-added data. First, because we don’t want to test 

absolutely everything. But, second of all, because in many cases 

teachers have an impact on the entire school. So if you are an art 

teacher, you only get kids for one class a week, but you have most 

of the school coming in, and you are contributing not just to the 

art education of those children but also to the school climate. So, 

in that context, I think it is actually appropriate; and I think 

teachers and principals have mixed views on what the right answer 

is here. 

Chairman KLINE. So, under the current system, you have got 65 

percent of this evaluation is not—65-35 is not the school-wide assessment. And so have you looked at changing those percentages 

or is that not possible under your system? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Well, right now, it is enshrined in State law. So 

the State law lays out the 35 percent value-added, 15 percent other 

academic achievement, 50 percent qualitative. 

We also have three additional systems that are being piloted by 

other districts this year. So they did field tests last year, and they 

asked if they could use these systems this year. They met the State 

law. And so we are going to watch how those systems work as well. 

One in Memphis sounds more similar to what Tom was describing 

about Denver. And I think it is going to be very interesting to gather all the data and see at the end of the year what people liked, 
55 

what seemed to work, what the range of distribution of scores 

were. 

Chairman KLINE. Okay. Thank you. 

I am going to run out of time here pretty quickly, so let me go 

to Mr. Boasberg. 

On the LEAP program, you are defining teacher effectiveness. 

For example, how are special education teachers, special educators 

evaluated under your system? 

Mr. BOASBERG. Sure. Thank you. 

Special education is an absolute critical mission of the Denver 

Public Schools, and one of the wonderful things about the LEAP 

program is we have peer observers who coach and give feedback to 

teachers. So, for example, we have master special education teachers who then go observe and give feedback to our special educators 

who are in their practice in the classroom. 

But special educators are observed and assessed under the same 

framework, where it is both the principal is observing and giving 

feedback, peers are observing and giving feedback, there is student 

perception of the educators, as well as we are looking at growth in 

their students’ achievements. 

Now, clearly, if you are looking at one of our self-contained classrooms for our highest and most severely disabled kids, that is going 

to be a little bit different. But the overwhelming majority of our 

special education students are included with our mainstream students in mainstream classrooms, and we have very high expectations and very high-level supports for special education students. 

We try and provide the same level of support and coaching and 

work with our special educators on the same basis as we work with 

our nonspecial educators. 

Chairman KLINE. Thank you very much. My time has more than 

expired. 

Mr. Miller. 

Mr. MILLER. Thank you very much, and thank you for all of your 

testimony. 

I note that there are certain consistencies. We have three different systems here, but there are certain consistencies in terms of 

how you chose to improve, hopefully, the teaching experience for 

teachers and the learning experience for the students. And the idea 

that this was done with everybody sitting at the table in one mixture or another that your systems chose. And the use of multiple 

measures, and you have given different weight to those measures 

in the three different systems that you have here. And a good deal 

of emphasis placed on additional training and professional development. 

But the three of you aren’t representative of the United States. 

I guess this is my concern. I think that at this particular moment 

we are in the most dynamic education reform environment that I 

have seen in my public life. And so I worry about losing the moment, as we do in politics sometimes. And that moment is, how do 

we make sure that these types of evaluation systems are extended 

across the country? 

We know there is resistance in a number of States, we know 

there is a minimal pulse sticking out there sort of suggesting someday we could be for this, and yet I wonder why we would con-
56 

tinue—certainly in school improvement, if we have these four models, why we are not making sure that school improvement funds 

are tied to an evaluation system. 

Again, I could take any of your three, I think. But that is not 

important. But the point is, why are we continuing to pretend like 

we can have these turnaround models if we don’t change that 

teaching and learning environment and make it a professional 

workplace for teachers and a professional learning space for the 

students? Or why would we continue to make Title II grants that 

aren’t tied to this kind of change? I mean, we are just funding the 

past. 

And I don’t want to use any more of my time. I want to hear 

from you. Let’s start with whatever order you want. 

Mr. BOASBERG. Sure. I will start, and please pitch in. 

I agree with you strongly. Denver has been one of the districts 

most active in the country in terms of trying to improve and turn 

around our lowest-performing schools. And at the heart of that is 

indeed trying to work to have the best possible school leader and 

provide the time and resources and ability to better develop and 

have stronger teachers. So, for example, in our schools that are receiving money for school improvement grants, they have a longer 

school year, they have a longer school day. All the teachers voted 

to work a 9-hour school day. 

Mr. MILLER. Let me just ask you. I know what you are doing. 

Can you imagine us continuing to give money where these changes 

aren’t brought about? 

Mr. BOASBERG. I want to be hesitant to tell you how to do your 

job. But I do think, as a taxpayer, it is fair to say that I think when 

the federal government gives money, and quite a bit of money, to 

have very high standards. We as a school district have very high 

expectations of our students and our professionals, and I think so 

should the federal government have very high standards of districts. 

And when money is coming in to have standards and accountability for the use of that money around having programs, around 

effective teachers, and having effective programs to turn around 

low-performing schools, to provide equity for our most disadvantaged students. I think that is a very appropriate role of the federal 

government. 

Mr. CICARELLA. I just perhaps might add, in terms of the federal 

influence, I think I have to agree with you. It doesn’t make sense 

to keep funding things that we know didn’t work and continue do 

that. Perhaps where you gentlemen and ladies can come in is, in 

terms of federal law, you never want to be heavy handed with overly prescribing things, yet, at the same time, perhaps some things 

that we could do. There could be an incentive for the type of collaboration that has existed. You know, encourage some local bargaining to continue. Encourage professional development to be tied 

to teacher evaluation plans. And that is for all teachers, not just 

those that are in need of improvement. Because even teachers that 

are effective, all teachers need help in different areas, even those 

that do a pretty good job. And the teachers and school districts, 

they really perhaps should have flexibility to determine that correct mix, a little different from Denver to New Haven. 
57 

But certainly, to answer your question, in terms of federal influence and what you should or shouldn’t do, again, I hesitate to tell 

you that, but I would agree. I would think that doing what we did 

in the past, you know, we do need to make some changes, and I 

think we have made a good start in a lot of places, and we do need 

to replicate those. 

Mr. HUFFMAN. My only addition would be that I think there has 

to be a lot of flexibility for States and districts to figure out what 

their plans are. We are excited about our plan, but I think the 

most important thing conceptually with all these evaluation plans 

is that there is an actual range of distribution. Because, of course, 

we had some level of evaluation before. It is just that 95 percent 

of the teachers were deemed to be outstanding. 

So there has to be a range of distribution. There have to be multiple things, including student achievement, that factor into it. And 

there has to be something then that happens as a result of the 

evaluation, something that happens positive in the form of feedback and professional development but also some level of incentives 

and consequences for the outliers on either pole of the system. And, 

beyond that, though, I don’t think we have figured out what the 

perfect system is. I think we need a lot of flexibility. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Dr. Roe. 

Mr. ROE. I thank the chairman. 

And if you were evaluating an art teacher and she worked on 

mine, she or he would be a failing teacher if I had to pass art. 

I want to mention two people, Ms. Chiles and Ms. Smith, who 

were my first grade teachers. And there is no question that the 

first 3 or 4 years of my life, or even longer, I had great teachers. 

Not a great school building. We had six grades in one room and 

two in the other. We didn’t have indoor plumbing or running water, 

but we had great teachers. And I think that and great principals, 

I think that leadership at the top. 

The question I have, I guess, in going back to Tennessee, and we 

are trying to figure this out, and trying to define a good teacher 

is extremely difficult to do. We all know what they are, but it is 

like beauty. It is just difficult to put a numerical number on it. 

Let me give you an example. In the No Child Left Behind, one 

of my former patients is a good friend of mine. Every time she asks 

me to come to her classroom, I go. And so I went this year and read 

to the students. And as I was getting ready to leave, I said, well, 

how is he doing? And she said, well, he will be back with me again 

next year. I said, why is that? And she said, well, he has missed 

60 days of class because his mother won’t get up and get him out 

the door to school. So he is going to be held back. 

And Jan, my friend, Jan Lindsay, my friend, a great teacher, is 

going to be evaluated on the fact that the parent didn’t get the 

child to school. How do you do that? And have we looked at the 

educational level of the parents? 

For instance, I know where my kids went to school, elementary 

school, a public school, the education level in those classes in the 

elementary school was plus five out of high school. Those are going 

to be successful teachers teaching those kids. Is that in the formula 

anywhere, where you look at the parents? 
58 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Thanks for the question. 

A couple of quick thoughts on that. So, one, with the value-added 

scores we have not seen that teachers teaching in the highest-need 

classrooms are disadvantaged in terms of the scores that they are 

actually getting. So there is a broad range. And there are some 

suburban schools that get great absolute scores, but their valueadded scores actually aren’t that good in terms of how far they 

have moved the kids. 

At the same time, I am proud to say that, as an alum of Teach 

for America, Teach for America and Vanderbilt have by far the 

highest impact on student achievement of any of the teacher providers in the State. And the Teach for America teachers are teaching in the highest-need areas, where they have the biggest challenges in terms of parents and families. 

Clearly, we have got to figure out how to get parents and families more engaged to help the education system, and one question 

is how you align interests. In Tennessee, one thing that they did, 

quickly, is they passed a law that made student grades, a portion 

of student grades, I think it is 25 percent, contingent on their 

standardized test results. And the idea was to ensure that you 

didn’t have students who simply just lay down on the job when it 

came to the standardized tests. Teachers felt strongly that they 

shouldn’t be held accountable for something if the students weren’t 

also going to have to take it seriously. And that is an example of 

aligning interests. 

Mr. ROE. Mr. Miller brought up a point a minute ago about 

how—my wife taught for 3 years in an inner city school in Memphis—and how you keep quality teachers in poor-performing 

schools. We have 50 percent of our educators drop out when they 

start college that don’t end up being teachers, and then within 5 

years 50 percent of our teachers stop. And so we are losing all this 

input. How do you do that? 

And the question I have also—and this is to any of you who may 

have evaluated this—is in all this evaluation of the teachers, are 

you getting any push-back? I know Mr. Cicarella, he made a point 

teachers don’t mind being evaluated. I never heard one that didn’t 

mind being held to a standard. The question is, are they getting 

burned out by—do they look like this as overly intrusive into their 

classrooms? 

Mr. CICARELLA. I can speak for New Haven, obviously. Myself, as 

a classroom teacher for 28 years, I mean, you do want to be evaluated; you want to be evaluated fairly. And our present system, even 

though, yes, there is a lot more accountability and responsibility, 

and consequential at the other end, perhaps, for some of us, but we 

accept that. As long as the evaluation system, you know, again, it 

is fair, we have some input into it, we prefer that. 

Because in the past, it was basically, I mean, the administrators 

would, you know, they would come in, and we would call them the 

drive-bys. They would come in, they would stay 5, 10 minutes, 

write something up, stick it in your mailbox. If it was good, no one 

complained. And if it was bad, we complained, but you couldn’t do 

anything about it. I mean, I would go to hearings with teachers, 

personnel, and we would say—the teacher would say, ‘‘But the 

principal is never there. These dates are—you know, that is not 
59 

correct.’’ The personnel director would look at the administrator, 

‘‘Are those dates correct? Is that your information?’’ ‘‘Yes.’’ And it 

was accepted as gospel. 

I mean, it was a ridiculous system. It wasn’t comprehensive. And 

that wasn’t the case all over, but that was very pervasive, to a certain degree. 

So even though the system is not perfect, by any means, we like 

it, because it is very clear to us now that—you know, there has 

been nervousness about it, as well, because it is new, as anything 

is. But we do like we know exactly what is expected of us. The 

goals are mutually agreed upon, you know, with the administrator, 

so it is clear what I need to do. 

And it is not unreasonable—and my final comment is, as a teacher, I have those kids in September. It is not unreasonable, when 

June comes, that they should make some progress. I mean, that 

should be expected of me. 

Mr. ROE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Loebsack? 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

I really want to thank the panel. This has been really enlightening. 

I am married to a former teacher of over 30 years, so I take some 

personal interest in this. But, also, I come from Iowa, and we are 

in a situation in Iowa where we are not what we used to be. And 

the Governor just had a 2-day conference in Iowa, and I think it 

is clear that the system in Iowa does need some improvement. We 

have prided ourselves in the past on being among the best in the 

country, and we have slipped. 

And I think that, certainly, teachers are maybe the major part 

of this, but we have to think about parents. And I think it was important that that was mentioned. We have to think about principals, superintendents, school boards, the community generally. I 

think we have to take kind of a whole-child approach to this, as 

well. We have to think about counselors, school nurses, the whole 

milieu, if you will, of support for our students. And I am glad we 

are focusing on teachers today, but we can’t lose sight of all these 

other things, these other people, these other factors that we have 

to take into account, too, I think, for us to have good schools. 

And I do want to ask you, Ms. Walsh, you said that you are now 

trying to evaluate schools of education, and you are running up 

against some resistance. But could you sort of lay out for us the 

different factors that you want to use for the evaluation process? 

Could you elaborate on that some? 

Ms. WALSH. Thank you. And I was just at the summit in Iowa 

and was very privileged to be there. 

What we are doing is applying 17 standards that look at both the 

content and pedagogical preparation of teachers. So we want to 

know if they are taught how to teach—if elementary teachers are 

taught how to teach reading; if they learn appropriate mathematics, because they have to lay the foundational skills in mathematics. We want to know if the education schools are appropriately 

selective and not just taking anybody. It is easier to get into an 
60 

education school in the United States than it is to qualify academically to play college football, so we want to change that dynamic. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Can I ask—I mean, that is a sweeping generalization. I mean—— 

Ms. WALSH. No, that is not true for every ed school, but—— 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Right. 

Ms. WALSH [continuing]. In the United States, it is easier to get 

into education school than it is to qualify to play college football. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Okay. 

Ms. WALSH. That is absolutely the truth. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Well, I would like to see some data on that from 

you, if you would. 

Ms. WALSH. I would be happy to show that. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Thank you. Go ahead. 

Ms. WALSH. So we are looking at the student teaching, whether 

or not they place student teachers in classrooms with effective cooperating teachers, rather than just any teacher. We are looking at 

the special education training that teachers get. 

So it is a wide range—I would be happy to share with you the 

full set of standards, but it is a comprehensive list. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Thank you. I appreciate that. 

Also, it was mentioned that principals—Mr. Huffman, I think 

you mentioned that principal evaluation starting this year in Tennessee. Do others on the panel have thoughts about that? Because, 

clearly, the principal is a very important part of the education enterprise; there is absolutely no doubt about that. 

Would you like to share, yeah, Rhode Island? 

Mr. CICARELLA. Yeah. In fact, in New Haven, one of the things, 

when we set out to do the reform, is we wanted top-to-bottom accountability. Teachers have no problem being accountable; we 

should be accountable, and we accept that. But so should the building principal, central office, as well. So we have systemic reform 

from top to bottom. 

So the teacher evaluation system is the one that got the most 

media attention in New Haven, and that is all very nice, but right 

next to it we created a new principal evaluation system and a central office, as well. So all three were revamped. And they are very, 

very similar. The same 1 to 5 rating, same matrix is used for all 

three. What they are rated on is different. 

But that is a central piece of our reform effort, is that it has to 

be top-to-bottom accountability. And all three systems—teachers, 

principal, and central offices—evaluations were revamped completely. 

In fact, in terms of the collaboration, I sat on the principal evaluation committee, which was, you know, very strange, to be in a 

room working on the principal’s evaluation, as a school—you know, 

as a teacher, obviously. But that is the way we did it. We wanted 

to make sure there was transparent input from everybody on both 

sides, whether it was the teachers evaluation system or the principals. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. All right. 

Mr. Boasberg? 

Mr. BOASBERG. Yeah, so I fully agree. I mean, our principals 

have a high degree of accountability already. They are at-will em-
61 

ployees. And we look very closely at a whole series of measures 

around their school, from student growth to parent satisfaction to 

student satisfaction to—we survey all of our teachers in the building to get very detailed information from the teachers about the 

performance of the school leader. 

We are also developing and will be rolling out this year a principal evaluation and feedback system that is fully aligned with the 

system for teachers. We think it is very important that those be 

fully aligned. And, as James said as well, it is not just principals 

but for every employee in the district, they are having multiple— 

at least one evaluation every year. 

I think it is important that there be a performance culture and 

ways to measure performance and provide feedback and coaching 

and also make personnel decisions based on that performance at 

every level of the school system—teachers, principals, district leaders. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Superintendents. 

Mr. BOASBERG. Superintendents, certainly. 

Mr. LOEBSACK. Right. Thank you. 

Chairman KLINE. I thought we had a UC agreement here. The 

gentleman’s time has expired. 

Dr. DesJarlais? 

Mr. DESJARLAIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you to our panel for appearing here today. 

Commissioner Huffman, you had mentioned a minute ago about 

your experience at Teach For America. Can you share with us a little bit about how this shaped your belief in the importance of a 

teacher evaluation system? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Yeah, thank you very much for the question. 

So, first of all, I think being a teacher in an inner-city school 

with lots of high-needs kids, the biggest thing that I learned was 

simply that all kids, regardless of their circumstances, can achieve 

at a high level if we, as adults, deliver the services that those kids 

deserve. 

And the other thing as it relates to teacher evaluation is, as with 

children, with adults there is a range of distribution of people’s performance. And, certainly, what I saw in my own school and what 

I think—this is not unique to a Teach For America experience, but 

I had colleagues who were in there at 6:30 in the morning, they 

were there at 6:30 at night, they were working hard, they were getting results for kids, and they were paid in lockstep with their colleague next-door who came from 8:00 to 3:00 and wasn’t particularly effective. They were paid in lockstep, and they were evaluated 

in lockstep as well. 

And that was a system that, quite clearly, didn’t make sense. It 

didn’t make sense for anybody. And so, you know, I think I came 

to have a full appreciation for the need to treat adults like adults 

and call it like it is and make sure that that tied somehow to how 

our students were advancing. 

Mr. DESJARLAIS. Okay. Thank you. 

You also mentioned that Tennessee has started rigorous Statefacilitated training sessions for district-level evaluators. Can you 

explain these training sessions in a little more detail and how they 

are going so far? 
62 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Yes. They have gone pretty well. So we have 

trained about 5,000 administrators. And the way it works is that 

district officials have to figure out how many people they are going 

to need in order to conduct the number of observations that they 

need. So it is principals, assistant principals, instructional leaders, 

and so on. And they come in for a 4-day intensive training. 

It has been run by TAP, who has created the rubric. So it is TAP 

experts who are coming in. There is a lot of videotape session, a 

lot of discussion, and a lot of analysis to try to norm people. The 

goal is that, across this rubric with 19 different sections, that people would become normed around what does a 1 look like, what 

does a 3 look like, what does a 5 look like, and be able to distinguish among them. 

And the feedback that we have had has been extremely positive. 

I have actually read a number of emails and encountered a number 

of people out who said they went in skeptical—so these are principals saying, ‘‘I went in skeptical. Another 4-day training, you 

know, another rubric.’’ And they came out saying, ‘‘This is going to 

help our teachers become better.’’ 

And, certainly, the field tests, that is the way the teachers felt, 

as well. Teachers, when they got feedback on the rubric, they said, 

‘‘I got helpful feedback, and I actually know what is expected of 

me.’’ 

Mr. DESJARLAIS. What are some of the potential problems that 

you have seen so far? And what do you plan to do about those? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Yeah, I think one of the big challenges on the observation side is just the range of distribution. We have to make 

sure that there is not grade inflation or grade deflation across different districts. 

One thing is that this is now tied to our tenure system. So Governor Haslam led the effort to pass meaningful tenure reform 

which turned tenure from a 3-year rubber stamp into a 5-year process where you have to score a 4 or a 5 on your evaluation in the 

last 2 years in order to get tenure. And I think that ups the stakes 

for making sure that there is consistency in application across districts. 

And one thing that we are doing, we have an online system that 

we are going to roll out, so we will see observation scores in realtime. So, for instance, in November, we would at the State level be 

able to see that this is the average observation score in county X 

and this is the average observation score in county Y. And if there 

is a massive difference and if that difference didn’t correlate to actual student achievement results, we would be able to go into county Y and provide retraining and so on to reform the system. 

Mr. DESJARLAIS. Well, thank you. I certainly applaud your efforts. 

And I yield back the little bit of remaining time I have. 

Chairman KLINE. I thank the gentleman for that. 

Ms. McCarthy, I think you are next. 

Mrs. MCCARTHY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, everybody, for your testimony. 

One of the themes that I seem to hear from all of you and 

through your testimony, obviously teacher evaluations are ex-
63 

tremely important, but also professional development activities are 

very important. 

One of the things that we have noticed is a lot of the young 

teachers, graduates, new graduates, seem to go into lower grades. 

So they are the most inexperienced teachers teaching probably the 

students that probably need the best teachers. 

With the evaluations and with professional development, how do 

you work around that? How do you bring a young teacher who 

wants to be in that career—we had a hearing many, many years 

ago, and we had four or five teachers there, new graduates, into 

the lower grades. And each one of them felt like they should drop 

out because they did not feel that they were qualified to teach. 

They wanted to stay as a teacher, but they weren’t having the professional development. 

So are you having, with what you are doing, the teachers very, 

very involved in professional development on where their weaknesses are and how can they improve so they can be even better 

teachers? Because they are the ones on the front lines. Even 

though you are principals or superintendents or commissioners, 

you have probably come through the ranks in some sort, one way 

or the other. I would like to hear those answers. 

Ms. WALSH. Well, I will start. I just want to make a clear point, 

that I would argue that no teacher should go into a classroom who 

hasn’t been taught how to teach reading or do any of the activities 

that young children need. So I think that the first order of business 

should be what kind of preparation we provided that teacher before 

she walked into the classroom. 

Then, I think that school districts are spending an inordinate 

amount of money on professional development activities. Some are 

worthwhile, and some are not. So I think that, in the process of 

better evaluation systems, we are beginning to identify how to tailor the professional development to teachers’ future needs. I think 

it has been very problematic, without the kind of comprehensive 

evaluation systems that are now being put in place, for school leaders to even know what a new teacher needs. 

Mrs. MCCARTHY. So, with that, how do the rest of you deal with 

teacher development to make sure that there are programs that 

are worthwhile for the teachers to participate in? 

Mr. CICARELLA. In the new teacher evaluation system in New 

Haven, the teacher and the instructional managers sit down and 

they self-rate themselves on the rubrics, of all the different areas. 

So I want to make sure, one, there is not a disconnect. If I am a 

teacher and I think I do a terrific job in classroom management 

and the instructional manager, you know, principal, doesn’t see 

that, you know—so it usually is a very good—it is a good tool to 

determine where are the weaknesses and then have some targeted 

and focused professional development. 

Because, too often, a lot of our money is spent on system-wide 

things. And they are valuable, to a certain degree, but a lot of it, 

quite frankly, is wasted, because we march all 1,600 teachers in 

New Haven to a professional development session, and we bring a 

consultant in, very high-paid, when perhaps 200 or 300 of those 

folks would benefit from that. 
64 

So our new evaluation system says that those areas of need are 

identified and agreed upon by the teacher and the principal. And 

then we will go ahead and target that and do less system-wide 

things and more either school-wide or even group-wide things—for 

example, classroom management. They would call in teachers that 

they have identified from the different schools in New Haven, and 

those teachers would attend those sessions. 

Mr. BOASBERG. I think we recognize how extraordinarily challenging a profession it is, even for very experienced teachers. And 

for new teachers coming in, it is an enormously challenging job. 

And I think we have tried to address that in a series of ways. 

One is a recognition that, as Kate said, a number of our teacher 

preparation programs aren’t where they need to be, in terms of 

truly preparing teachers to come in and be effective teachers from 

the beginning. So we have a multiplicity of areas where we try and 

recruit teachers from, both from our teacher schools of education, 

but Teach For America. 

We recently set up our own residency program, where high-talented individuals come in for an entire year, are resident teachers 

in the classroom of master teachers to really observe and learn 

teaching practices and gradually take increased teaching responsibilities under the eye every day of that master teacher. And I 

think that program has been very successful in developing teaching 

practices among our young teachers. 

And I think part of this is, if you look at our system and other 

systems, there has often has been too much emphasis on content. 

And if you look at our system, our teachers often do a lot better 

on content knowledge than they do on the most challenging pedagogical skills—for example, around differentiation, to mean different students need developing academic knowledge, developing 

problem solving, innovation, 21st-century skills. And I think one 

the things that we need to do and a lot of systems need to do a 

lot better is, yes, you do need to understand the content. I don’t 

mean to demean content; content is important. But content is only 

one part of this, and have a much greater focus on the professional 

in-classroom skills that teachers need to be effective to meet the 

very diverse needs of the 20, 25, 28 kids who are with them every 

day. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

Dr. Bucshon? 

Mr. BUCSHON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I was a surgeon previously, and I will make a few comments, and 

then I will have a question more related to how we get people to 

become teachers. 

Many physicians score well on standardized tests. Many have 

been in the top of their class. But ultimately, once you are in practice, the outcome of your patients is what is important. The best 

doctors are not necessarily those who score best on the test. And 

there is an art to the practice of medicine, as I believe there is in 

teaching. 

The people that know the best how you do as a physician are 

those in your local community—the nurses, the other people that 

work with you, as well as your patients and family. Again, in my 
65 

view, this is applicable to teachers. And, ultimately, what counts 

is the success of students. 

That said, I think all of us here today have recognized that student success is a multi-factorial equation, of which quality teachers 

are a very important part of it. 

So my question really is to anyone, to all of you, is, what can we 

do to continue to convince our best and brightest students to become teachers? And what can we do to attract even more of our 

best and bright students to become teachers? I think this is a fundamental issue that we appear to be struggling with, as we are in 

medicine. 

Mr. HUFFMAN. I will jump in, and I know Kate is chomping at 

the bit. 

But from my experience at Teach For America, one thing we can 

do is recruit them. It is fascinating to me that, basically, if you look 

at the way many schools of education operate, they hang out a 

shingle and hope the people come and apply to want to be a teacher. There is not a proactive effort to go and find the best people 

and make the case to them why teaching should be what they 

choose to do. 

And at Teach For America, it is hard work, but it is actually doable to go out and get tens of thousands of very talented people to 

say that they want to become a teacher. And it takes meeting with 

them, sitting down with them, explaining the value proposition, explaining the leadership opportunity, the chance to make an impact 

on the most pressing social justice issue in our country. 

And, frankly, I just think schools of education have punted on 

that. They have been willing to take who comes in the door, rather 

than go out and proactively seek people. 

Ms. WALSH. I would agree with everything Commissioner 

Huffman has said. 

I just want to add that I think that one of the reasons that teaching has become low status is because the preparation of teachers 

has become such low status. We know that half the people that 

graduate from an education program don’t even get a teaching job, 

they don’t apply for a teaching job. So you have to ask yourself, 

why is it that so many people are going to an education school with 

no intention of ever becoming a teacher? And I fear that, for too 

many of those individuals, they have gone into the education school 

because it may be the easiest program on the college campus to 

complete. 

If you compare that data with what Teach For America has managed to achieve, Teach For America has managed to convey very 

high status to getting into its program. That does not mean all that 

Teach For America does is look at test scores, but it is the first 

gate. You have to meet a minimum level. So it is quite an honor 

to make it through that first gate, and then you have to go through 

many gates after that. 

So the selectivity that that program has modeled for the rest of 

us on how to attract the best and the brightest is a crucial, crucial 

point. But I have to say that when I go out and speak with deans 

of the schools of education, they push back quite vehemently on the 

notion that they need to become far more selective about who gets 

into their programs. 
66 

Mr. CICARELLA. I would just say, I mean, in terms of teaching, 

I think we all agree, no one becomes a teacher—is not about 

money—no one becomes a teacher to get rich. That is never going 

to happen, and we know that. The motivation is very different. 

In terms of attracting them and keeping them, one of the problems we have, it is a demanding job, first of all, obviously. But they 

need to have some input, not be blamed. That is probably—I mean, 

some of them just—many of the teachers kind of throw up their 

hands, ‘‘I am just not doing this. It is just not worth it.’’ So we need 

to maybe get a shift of the attitude, that we are not going to blame 

the teachers. You have to be accountable, you have to be responsible, but this, you know, consistent blaming that if the students 

aren’t scoring well and you are the teacher in front of the classroom, therefore it has to be your fault and you have to go. 

We need to be accountable, we need to be responsible for student 

learning, no question. But I think that is a big issue. A lot of the 

teachers just don’t feel that they are valued. And then they just get 

to the point where it becomes too frustrating. 

Mr. BUCSHON. Thank you. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Hinojosa? 

Mr. HINOJOSA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman Kline and Ranking Member Miller, thank you for calling this congressional hearing on education reforms. 

If we are to remain globally competitive, we must modernize the 

teaching profession and provide our nation’s teachers with the support they need to build their knowledge and skills to grow in the 

field and advance their careers. 

In regard to teacher evaluation, accountability, and tenure, I 

strongly believe that these decisions should be made at the State 

and local level, with the full participation of teachers, drawing on 

their expertise and knowledge to improve teaching and learning. 

Today, I ask my colleagues to consider the work that high-achieving nations such as Finland, South Korea, and Singapore have 

done to modernize and to build the capacity of their teaching workforce, as well as innovative teacher development and evaluation 

systems here in our country, in the United States. It is critical that 

teachers are given the opportunity to develop their expertise both 

as they enter the profession and throughout their careers. 

I would like to ask my first question to David Cicarella. 

Mr. Cicarella, I commend you and the New Haven Federation of 

Teachers for partnering with your local school system to develop 

valid, reliable, transparent, and ongoing teacher development and 

evaluation systems. It seems to me that this is the type of collaboration and leadership that our schools need. 

I read your testimony. You indicate that the New Haven Federation of Teachers contract was ratified by a vote of 855-42 and 

hailed by the local media as a first-in-the-nation agreement between a city and a teachers’ union to work together to change the 

way public schools work. 

What is unique about your teacher evaluation plan? How does it 

improve teaching and learning and prepare our students to be 

college- and career-ready? And the last part of that question is, 
67 

why is it critical to have multiple measures of student achievement? 

Mr. CICARELLA. I will start with the last piece first, the multiple 

measures. 

State tests—very often, we say, well, let’s look at the State test 

and make that the sole factor in the teacher’s evaluation. ‘‘If the 

kids didn’t learn the material and you are the teacher, it must be 

your fault.’’ Well, one, the State test is too—the State tests were 

never, ever designed to evaluate teachers. They are designed to 

give us data so we can drive our instruction. Essentially, very simply, tell us what the kids know and what the kids don’t know, and 

then we can adjust our instruction there. So they weren’t created 

for that purpose. 

So what we do need is the multiple measures. So, yes, do we 

have to look at the State tests? Absolutely. I mean, they are important, they give us some good data, but it is just one piece. We don’t 

want to look at a student and make an assessment of him simply 

by how he does one week on a test in March in Connecticut, for 

example. So that is why we need other measures of assessment 

that I referenced. 

The second reason is, in many districts, in New Haven, only 22 

percent of the teachers teach in subjects covered by our Connecticut Mastery Test and our comprehensive assessment test in 

high school. So even if we wanted to, even if you wanted to make 

that argument, ‘‘Well, darn it, we are going to use those State tests 

because that is what we care about,’’ you couldn’t evaluate more 

than three-fourths of our teachers. And that is true in many parts 

of the country. So, from a practical standpoint, we need multiple 

measures, but also from a professional standpoint. The State tests 

are not designed to evaluate teachers. 

Your question about—I wanted to make a point about the evaluation system. There are three components, in terms of the overwhelming support that we got for it. It is, one, that the teachers 

were valued. We sat there for an entire year, side-by-side, administrators and teachers, putting the system together—the teacher 

evaluation system, the principal evaluation system, the surveys, 

which we did extensively as well. And it emphasized top-to-bottom 

accountability. So everyone is buying in because they felt that it 

was important and that it is not just a matter of, ‘‘We have to fix 

the teachers.’’ Yes, we need to do—there is certainly a lot of improvement we need on our side, and we recognize that and we accept it. But in New Haven, they have also said, yeah, we have to 

look up and down the ladder, as well. 

And the last piece is the three components. The teacher evaluations shouldn’t be merely test scores. Student learning is front and 

center, no question. In New Haven, it is roughly half. We don’t like 

strict percentages on that. But, you know, the bottom line is that 

the kids have to learn; that is our job. But we also should be evaluated on things such as our instructional practices, classroom management, delivery of instruction, as well as our professional values. 

Mr. HINOJOSA. Thank you. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Dr. Heck, you are recognized. 

Mr. HECK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 
68 

And thank you all for being here and sharing your experiences. 

I represent the Clark County School District in Nevada, which 

is the fifth-largest school district in the nation. And we are certainly struggling with many of the same issues that you have 

faced. And I have learned a lot from reading through your testimony and hearing you today, and hopefully we will bring back 

some best practices for our district to take a look at. 

My undergraduate degree was in education, and I thought I was 

going to be a teacher until I did my student teaching. Then I realized that I needed something less stressful as a career, so I went 

into emergency medicine. And I still feel that that career is much 

less stressful than a career as a teacher. 

Mr. Huffman, in your testimony, you talked about the multiple 

evaluation parameters. And you had 15 percent of the evaluation 

determined by other student achievement metrics, selected through 

a joint decision by principals and individual teachers. Can you give 

some examples of what those other metrics were, how they were selected, and how they are actually measured? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. Sure. So, for example, if you were teaching in 

high school, you might say, we are going to use AP exams, and we 

are going to see what the pass rate is or the percentage of students 

that are able to get a 3 on AP exams. Or you might say, ACT 

scores. Now all juniors across the State of Tennessee are taking the 

ACT, and so you might say, we are going to look at improvement 

in ACT scores. 

We are working with technical experts to figure out how to actually do the ranking of that and then how to compile it all back in, 

because I think that is one of the tricky pieces. It is actually tricky 

even outside of that. You get your value-added score, and then you 

have your observation scores, and how do you combine it all so that 

it winds up with one number? So we have technical experts from 

higher ed that are helping us figure that piece out. 

Mr. HECK. Do you foresee using things other than other types of 

test scores for that 15 percent? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. You could imagine using things that are different 

than test scores. But I think what is important to me is that there 

is some level of consistency in the scoring and that there is a range 

of distribution. What I don’t want to see is that if you teach X subject compared to Y subject, it simply is easier to get a more positive 

evaluation. So we have to figure out how to make sure that the 

range of distribution is reasonable so that we are continuing to 

incent people to go into the range of subjects. 

Mr. HECK. Well, I know one of the concerns I have had, as my 

State legislature has tried to grapple with this issue, is too much 

of a reliance on test scores. You know, I know I am a great testtaker. And I know I can go back to high school shop class and get 

the manual on how to rebuild an engine, and you give me a written 

test tomorrow, I will ace it. But I guarantee you, I am not the guy 

you want rebuilding your engine, when it comes time to actually 

do the hands-on repair. And so that is the issue that we are struggling with, is that balance of where does testing fall in the overall 

scheme of teacher evaluation. So I appreciate that. 

Mr. Boasberg, one of your parameters is student perception. And 

you say, ‘‘students know when they have a great teacher.’’ I cer-
69 

tainly agree with that. But I am sure that changes from when you 

are in 1st grade, what a great teacher means to you, then when 

you are in 12th grade. So how do you account for how students interpret what a great teacher is in that metric? 

Mr. BOASBERG. So, I see those measures primarily at the secondary level, rather than the elementary level, I agree. And as a 

parent—my youngest will be in 1st grade, although I think he actually got a pretty good sense of who is a great teacher or not. 

But I do think that what we have seen nationally is that if you 

ask the right set of questions and not just, ‘‘Is this person a nice 

person,’’ but, ‘‘Does this person challenge you,’’ ‘‘Does this person 

follow up with you,’’ ‘‘Does this person meet your individuals 

needs,’’ ‘‘Are the students on task in the classroom; do they begin 

work immediately,’’ that you see a pretty high correlation in those 

results from student questions to student achievement. 

So this is primarily an issue for our secondary students. And I 

think the students do have a very good sense. As a student, I remember very well who my great teachers were, and I knew within 

a very short period of time who my great teachers were and which 

teachers weren’t very good. And I think it is very important that 

we get that student voice, particularly at the secondary level. 

Mr. HECK. Thank you. 

And, Ms. Walsh, based on the presentations of the other three 

panelists, what do you feel the role is and how can the federal government help support teacher reform efforts without interfering in 

the effective practices at the State and local level? 

Ms. WALSH. I will answer your question; I just wanted to add, 

there is a study out by the Gates Foundation that shows that students’ perceptions of their teachers correlate with the results as 

low as students in 4th grade. And they didn’t do anyone lower than 

4th grade, so it may correlate down even further. So it is rather— 

you know, students have 180 days to observe their teachers, and 

nobody else has that advantage, so it is something we should respect. 

In terms of the federal role, it is very complicated because, you 

know, this is a rather blunt instrument, and trying to tackle these 

issues is extremely tough, especially at this stage of their development. I know Mr. Miller was asking a somewhat similar question. 

And I think, at this point, we are very much in an experimental 

stage, with the great work these three gentleman are doing and in 

a lot of districts. So we don’t have definitive answers that maybe 

would lead to federal policy at this point that was either you do or 

you don’t. 

But I do think there is a role for federal government in the reporting requirements and in the carrot. I mean, I think that we 

found through Race to the Top that that carrot really encouraged 

States to make some important reforms. But, more importantly, 

you need to look at—Race to the Top is not offering any carrot 

right now, and there are still States that are very much embracing 

these new sets of reforms. So I think we can all feel very encouraged by the activity and momentum that we are seeing currently. 

So I think with reporting requirements and transparency and 

tying some strings to what carrots we have, I think that is what 

is most appropriate at this point. 
70 

Mr. HECK. Great. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Payne? 

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much. 

I really appreciate your testimony. 

I think that was an interesting question that the gentleman—or 

a statement he made, about the student perception of teachers, 

teachers that do well. I think also, though, that same concept of the 

teacher’s perception of the student or students, I think, also tends 

to be important. Because we find that, in high-poverty areas, there 

may be a low expectation of the student and, therefore, the teacher 

teaches down. So I think the perception of the student to the teacher is probably even less important than the teacher’s perception to 

the student, which people would tend to maybe teach down to. 

I just want to mention a couple of things just quickly. We know 

that poor, minority students are taught by novice and out-of-field 

teachers at a much higher rate than their affluent peers. For example, in high-poverty secondary schools and those serving most minority students, more than one out of three core academic classes 

are taught by out-of-field teachers, compared to one out of five 

where the low-poverty students are. So you have less qualified 

teachers, as it is very clear. 

Additionally, children in the highest-poverty and high-minority 

schools are assigned to novice teachers almost twice as often as 

children in low-poverty schools or schools without many minority 

students. 

And, finally, just to achieve true equity in education, federal, 

State, and local education policy must prioritize access to highquality teachers for all students, including better measures of identifying high-quality teachers. 

Which, Ms. Walsh, brings me to a question. You noted in your 

written testimony that teachers are the single most important factor in determining the success of children in schools, which I agree 

with, although I think principals are certainly important, too, to 

lead the teachers. And In No Child Left Behind, one thing that was 

left out was principals. They just didn’t deal with principals. It 

dealt with a lot of things, but not principals. 

And, of course, we mentioned about testing. And one of the gentlemen said he tested well. We know that with the high-stakes testing, we have even seen our educational system unfortunately have 

teachers and schools changing scores because of the pressure of 

the—— 

Ms. WALSH. Uh-huh. 

Mr. PAYNE [continuing]. High-stakes tests that I opposed in 

the—I think we need to evaluate students, there is no question 

about it. I mean, when I was a kid, many, many decades ago, you 

know, they evaluated students, so it is not new. I mean, you had 

a pass or you failed, and they had a way of grading you. But all 

of a sudden, you have high-stakes testing at 3rd grade and 6th 

grade, and kids are pushed into courses of learning to lead toward 

the test. And I am not so sure how much learning goes on when 

you teach toward the test. 
71 

But, as you mentioned, Ms. Walsh, that all States should be developed to require a teacher quality index—agree. Yet you state 

that Title II funds should be competitive. Now, isn’t that recommendation kind of counterintuitive? Because why is it better to 

provide such critical support for teacher evaluation systems and 

meaningful professional development only to a lucky few States or, 

in turn, to a lucky few schools or lucky teachers and students? You 

want to highlight what teachers are effective or ineffective in the 

State, but, you know—that is your testimony—you don’t necessarily want to provide support to all States to improve the teaching force. 

So I think that transparency is certainly important in teacher 

quality, but transparency is really not enough. I think there needs 

to be a systematic change and systematic support to ensure equity. 

So I wonder about the competitiveness that you feel should be for 

Title II funds, which would eliminate many other schools that need 

it, probably even more. 

Ms. WALSH. I certainly understand and share your concerns 

about the States and districts that don’t win such competitions, but 

I would ask you, what is the alternative we are facing? The alternative is we are currently spending some $3 billion a year on something that the taxpayer and those children in the classrooms are 

seeing far too little as a result of that investment. 

So I think the alternative here has not proven effective, the status quo. So we are looking for ways that we can use that same pot 

of money without depriving children of the investment that they 

would entail, but to use it more effectively and lead to much 

stronger results. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Thompson? 

Mr. THOMPSON. Thank you, Chairman. 

Thanks to the panel for being here. 

I appreciate the conversation and a lot of zeroing in on teacher 

evaluation and, obviously, what we do with that to develop all 

teachers into highly effective teachers. 

I want to back up a little bit. I know in my career—I came out 

of health care, and as I was a manager within hospitals, frankly, 

the best time we invested was hiring right, because you avoid so 

many problems. And, frankly, once you get somebody, when you 

don’t hire right—and everybody is kind of, for the most part, smiling and shaking your heads; you understand the consequences of 

not hiring right to begin with. 

So I just want to throw this out to begin with. Is there a best 

practice that you have identified—I want to open this up to the 

panel; if you could be succinct, I have a couple questions—that is 

a best practice for making sure that we are hiring truly highly effective teachers? I don’t think it is important whether they are novice or new or veterans or how many years of service. We just want 

the right people, and that is the highly effective ones. 

So, if you could start, please. 

Mr. HUFFMAN. I will just jump in quickly and say I really appreciate the question, because as I have started my role as commissioner, this is something that I am really grappling with. I com-
72 

pletely agree with your point, that if you hire the right people in 

the door in the first place, it solves so many problems. 

One of the things I have seen in my travels around the State is 

that a lot of the hiring is effectiveness-blind, and it is done based 

on historical patterns of hiring. So people tend to hire from the 

higher-ed institution that is geographically closest to the school district, and people are hiring without rubrics that are tied to effectiveness. 

I mean, I do think there is a tie to teacher evaluation, in the 

sense that it allows us to collect more data that we can tie back 

to characteristics of people and hopefully help develop rubrics that 

we can give to districts that will help them understand what are 

the attributes of teachers most likely to perform effectively when 

they are in the classroom, because I think that is what we have 

to be doing. But right now, the system is not where it needs to be. 

Mr. BOASBERG. I think that—a couple things. One is to make 

sure, as a district, we have multiple sources we are hiring from. We 

don’t want a situation where we are effectively hiring from only 

one source. So we not only hire from colleges of education, we have 

programs like Teach For America, we have a residency program, 

we have a mid-career program called the Denver Teaching Fellows. 

Because you want multiple applicants to choose from to be able to 

choose the best applicants. 

Second, we are very decentralized. We have principals and teachers who, in that building, as a personnel selection committee, interview the specific teachers. And decisions are made at the school 

level. We don’t do district-based hiring assignments. We want that 

one-on-one contact and professional judgment of the principal in 

the school. 

Thirdly, I think it is really seeing someone teach. This is a profession—and paper qualifications are great, but it is really about 

how you do in the classroom. 

And, fourthly, I would add, while I strongly agree that hiring the 

best possible people is vital, in any profession sometimes you make 

hiring decisions that don’t turn out great or maybe were good at 

the time but over time is not a great fit. And I do think, while we 

need to focus on our hiring, we also need to recognize that some 

of the systems that we have about replacing low performers certainly need to be changed as well. 

Mr. CICARELLA. I just might echo some of the same things; that 

the paper resume is nice, but we can all put those together. And 

interviews, we all get trained on interviews and do a nice job in 

front of the, you know—but—so we do need, I think, in particular, 

to be sure that these people have kind of been field-tested. I mean, 

student teaching is supposed to do that, and it does to a certain 

degree, but, you know, a little bit more than that. Because we do 

need to see them in action. And many school districts are doing 

that now. You have to come in and do a lesson in one of the schools 

before you are hired, as a requirement to be hired. 

My only other comment I will make quickly is that I appreciate 

your comment about whether it is new or old. Sometimes reference 

is made that the newer teachers—I mean, we have new teachers 

that are very effective, that are terrific. They bring lots of energy. 

They are inexperienced, but they more than make up for that in 
73 

some other areas. Not every veteran teacher is tired and worn-out. 

I mean, colleagues of mine, teaching 25, 30 years, they have just 

as much energy. They are in there, 6:30 in the morning, 7 o’clock, 

with the young ones. So years of service, that is really nothing to 

look at. 

So I agree with you that when we are doing hiring, we don’t 

want to necessarily say, ‘‘Well, we better make sure we have young 

teachers,’’ or, ‘‘We better get some veteran teachers.’’ The best 

school systems have a mix of both. The new people bring energy 

and new ideas. Our veterans have a lot of experience that we can 

rely on. And the best school system will have a mix of the two, and 

we don’t want to preclude one from another. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Ms. Davis? 

Mrs. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you all for being here. I really appreciate your testimony. 

I am trying to do double duty, but I did hear from all of you and 

read your testimony. 

And I was particularly interested—for one thing, I actually did 

introduce a bill, it is called the STELLAR Act. I hope you will take 

a look at that, in terms of evaluations that are tied into, I think, 

one of the issues that you particularly addressed, Ms. Walsh, Title 

I. So I would like to ask you about that. 

But first, Mr. Cicarella, buy-in is just a tough issue. I am from 

San Diego, California. And I think that there have been enough instances within, I think, most school districts where it has been 

tough to get that at a level where people really believe that the 

people doing the evaluations are going to be skilled enough to be 

able to really assist and promote professionalism as opposed to just 

doing something to teachers. And it is something you obviously 

grappled with. 

Is there anything else you could share with us in terms of getting 

that buy-in particularly, and how you worked hand-in-glove, essentially, with making certain that the observers, I think as you called 

them, were adequately trained in the eyes of teachers to actually 

do that? Were most of the teachers also mentor-teachers, nationally 

board-certified teachers? Where did you find those observers, from 

the existing ranks? Or did people, retired principals, teachers come 

in? How did you do that? 

Mr. CICARELLA. Yeah, that was a big concern of ours, is that we 

have a new evaluation system which will be consequential for 

some, and we recognized that. But we wanted to make sure that 

it was done fairly and that teachers weren’t scapegoated and a finger was pointed at them perhaps by an administrator that is not 

a good instructional leader, does a no-good evaluation, you know, 

‘‘The school is not conducive to learning.’’ 

So one of the pieces we put in, we put a third-party validation 

in, where we have the outside observers come in. And that we 

agreed to with the school district. And they are a combination: 

They are sitting superintendents; some are retired. Principals, 

again, some active, some retired. None of them from New Haven; 

they are all from other districts throughout the State. And they 

would come in. 
74 

So one of the protections the teachers felt was that there is going 

to be someone else. Until we get to that point where we have confidence in the administrator’s ability to fairly evaluate—New 

Haven, we have pretty much a mixed bag. We have some administrators who are absolutely terrific. They can be an administrator 

anywhere in this country. On the other end of the spectrum, we 

have some, quite frankly, that shouldn’t be in the principal’s chair. 

And that was our concern. 

So to get the buy-in that you are talking about from the teachers, 

we put in a third-party validation system. I can speak to you more 

about it; I know time doesn’t permit it. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Uh-huh. Okay. 

Mr. CICARELLA. But those folks come in, and they are observed 

by both the principal or assistant principal and this third party, 

this outside validator, who was interviewed by the teachers’ union 

and the school district and we agreed upon them. 

And these people had excellent track records of evaluation and 

of handling staff. And we had to agree to each one. So when we 

interviewed them, you know, we would say, ‘‘This one. Nope, not 

this one. This one. Yes, this one is okay.’’ So, at the end of the day, 

we have a cadre validators, third-party validators, that we all have 

complete confidence in. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Uh-huh. Thank you. I appreciate it. 

I think one of the things that we are searching for and something 

that would be carried if we go in this direction—and I think I 

heard from everybody that you do see a federal role here—is to 

allow—you know, it is definitely not a one-size-fits-all, but it is the 

process that school districts would go through over a period of time, 

even up to 5 years, that would provide this kind of a setting so that 

they can do the appropriate work of getting this together. That 

may or may not be too long, I am not sure. 

Ms. Walsh, when you talked in your testimony about Title I 

funds being essentially tied to quality data, and we know that 

those systems are very important, could you expand a little bit 

more on that and why you think that that would be essential as 

we move to having, I would hope, more evaluations throughout the 

country? 

Ms. WALSH. I just want to make sure—a correction, that I was 

talking about Title II funding and the $3 billion, money that goes 

toward—largely, it is being spent to reduce class size and for professional development. 

And I think both parties have been a little bit disturbed by the 

lack of results that have come from that annual investment and 

have grappled with ways to make it more effective. So we think 

that it is an opportunity to use that money as a carrot to hold out 

to districts and States, saying, ‘‘Look, we need to do things a little 

bit differently here. We need to move toward an evaluation system, 

that all teachers are being evaluated fairly and reliably but annually.’’ So we think that there is an opportunity here to use that 

money much more productively. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Uh-huh. 

Mr. BOASBERG. Could I add a word about the federal role? 

Chairman KLINE. I am sorry, the gentlelady’s time has expired. 

We will try to work that in. 
75 

Mr. Tierney? 

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you very much. 

Can any of you speak a little bit to whether or not we should 

have an expectation of our higher education institutions for that 

period of time after they give out the BA or the BS to somebody 

that goes in the teaching profession and what that responsibility 

might be? 

Ms. WALSH. I am sorry, I didn’t—would you restate your question, please? 

Mr. TIERNEY. Usually, they flip the ball to you, and you hadn’t 

even heard the question. They are all just shuffling it down. 

Should we have an expectation for higher education institutions 

that produce teachers—— 

Ms. WALSH. Oh. 

Mr. TIERNEY [continuing]. Beyond the time that they give you 

your degree? And what is that expectation that we should have? 

Ms. WALSH. I mean, we certainly struggle with that issue. There 

are some education schools that have said, you know, if you are 

dissatisfied with our product, we will, at our own expense, retrain 

or re-prepare that teacher. And then there are also, on a much 

broader scale, there is an effort nationwide to look at the value-add 

of teacher graduates once they leave an institution and how much 

they contribute to the performance in a classroom. So we know that 

teachers from one institution are more effective than another. I 

know Tennessee has been a pioneer in that effort. 

There are some limitations. It is not something we can do very 

easily. But, currently, there are only three States in the country 

that allow us to do that. But even when we do have all 50 States 

providing that kind of data, it will not ever tell us, well, what is 

it that education schools are doing right or wrong? 

Mr. TIERNEY. Well, is—and, also, thinking along the line, regardless of whether or not a particular institution that might be located 

in a particular geographic area graduated that teacher, might they 

not have some responsibility with the community in which they are 

located to support that teacher? 

You know, particularly, we have these instances where a lot of 

the students that are high-poverty and high-risk are getting teachers that are newer, often less experienced, and sometimes teaching 

out of subject. So is there something that can happen there, where 

those institutions work with the community and support those 

teachers to help improve their performance? 

Ms. WALSH. There is a great deal of interest on the part of institutions becoming more involved in the clinical practice and in real 

schools. That is a change that we have seen happen, and I think 

that is all great. 

I would just think that we need to attend also to this the basic 

needs of new teachers, and are they coming out of an education 

school with the basic credentials—not credentials, but work that 

they should have done before they go into classrooms? 

Do you realize that there are over a million children a year assigned to first-year teachers? And if you look at the contribution of 

first-year teachers to student growth, it is not good. Students lose 

ground consistently under first-year teachers. So we know that 
76 

children who are in high-poverty schools where there is a lot of 

turnover have more of those first-year teachers. 

It doesn’t need to be that way. We have seen programs that have 

delivered teachers well-prepared into schools on day one. And they 

do not lose ground; they make up—they make progress. 

Mr. TIERNEY. And going along with your point earlier about a lot 

of students feeling that they can get into an education program because it is easier to get accepted and easier to complete, what 

would be the change in that if we paid teachers at a level, say, that 

we pay police officers? In our communities, when they publish the 

income of public employees, the police officers are always the first 

10, 12, 20 positions on that, or other people in that category. 

What if we paid our teachers like that, so that people knew, if 

they graduated and did well in a teaching job, they would make 

that kind of money and might want to sustain it as a career? Do 

you think that would have a positive impact? 

Ms. WALSH. I think it is absolutely critical. I think one of the 

reasons we are not attracting the best and the brightest into the 

teaching profession is because they are in college and they look at 

their future careers and they know exactly how much they will 

earn in 25 years if they go to work in the school district, adjusted 

for inflation. That is not a incentive to most 21-year-olds. 

We have to make it possible for young individuals, college graduates, to say, you know, ‘‘If I am really good at this job, I am going 

to make a very nice income. It is all going to depend on my contributing talent and skill.’’ 

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you. 

I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KLINE. Thank the gentleman. 

Mr. Holt. 

Mr. HOLT. Thank you. 

Well, I won’t pursue Mr. Tierney’s line of questioning except just 

to comment that in my own State, where we have the top public 

official in the State insulting teachers and telling them that they 

are getting too much in health benefits and pension, it is not leading too many people in that profession. 

Two very different questions. First, looking at science and math 

education—I am not sure who I am directing this to, probably Ms. 

Walsh—but we used to have the Eisenhower funds, which provided 

something on the order of $400 million a year to teachers all over 

the country for professional development, mostly in science and 

math. That was turned into Science and Math Partnerships, funded at about a third of what Eisenhower funds had been. And now 

those funds, this administration has proposed be pooled with all 

sorts of other things. 

So there is nothing nationally available that is specifically for 

science and math teacher professional development. What is the 

strategy that we should be using? Is there any different strategy 

that we should be using for the professional development of science 

and math teachers? I am using this term kind of broadly, the 

STEM areas. And maybe others would have comments on that. 

Teach For America seems to be bringing a lot of science majors 

into teaching, at least temporarily; and they do have some different 

training, I believe, for the students who are doing that. 
77 

Well, let me let you talk. 

Ms. WALSH. Well, you know, it is such an important question, 

and we get asked it a lot. And I am just going to be honest with 

you, I find it a little frustrating. Because, in terms of professional 

development for science and math teachers, right now, if you are 

an elementary teacher, it is too often the case where people say, 

well, I am an elementary teacher because I am not any good at 

math. And yet they are the first teachers of our students in mathematics. 

We know what preparation elementary teachers do need to be effective in the classroom. We know exactly what they should be 

learning. But, nevertheless, across the country, if you look at what 

kind of preparation teachers are getting in mathematics, it is all 

over the map. There are programs that provide no courses. There 

are programs that provide any courses. There is no consensus. 

So I think the best thing the U.S. Congress could do is to look 

to the State of Massachusetts, which is the only State in the 

United States which is currently requiring its elementary teachers 

to pass a rigorous test in mathematics. There are a lot of States 

that require any test, but there is only one State that is making 

real progress. 

So rather than try to get—I just think that this testing issue is 

the easiest way to reshape the practices and policies of States. So 

I just think it is ultimately very important, and I don’t think that 

we should burden school districts with the job of providing the content preparation that should have happened before teachers arrive 

in their school districts. 

Mr. HOLT. Would the other witnesses—Mr. Cicarella, please? 

Mr. CICARELLA. Yes, perhaps two comments. 

On science and math, I referenced earlier that teachers don’t become teachers to make money. But there is such a disparity between what the folks can make on the outside. I was a math major. 

I can make a lot more money on the outside than teaching. I chose 

to do it, and many of us do, but that is a difficult one. And not that 

money is always the answer, but that is part of the problem we 

have. There is such a disparity in the salaries, if you have a math 

or science degree, on the outside as opposed to education. 

And then the only comment I want to mention about Teach for 

America, they are a terrific organization. My daughter is a TFA 

person, so I very much like those kids. They are bright, they are 

driven, they work hard. But in terms of training, they have no special training. Quite frankly, it is just simply a crash course. I can 

speak firsthand. My daughter went through it. They come from 

outstanding colleges. My daughter was a Boston University graduate. 

Mr. HOLT. Yeah, more than 15 percent of the graduating class 

at Princeton University applied for Teach for America. 

Mr. CICARELLA. Yeah. But their training is one summer. They 

have one summer of training, and they have some follow-up work 

with their folks. So they are not doing anything special with math 

and science. That is a good organization, they do good work, but 

they are not helping us with the math and science problem. 

Chairman KLINE. The gentleman’s time has expired. Ms. Woolsey. 
78 

Ms. WOOLSEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

One of my biggest concerns for a long time with our public education system and with evaluating teachers fairly to see how well 

they are doing is that many classrooms, many districts, many cities 

in general provide teachers with kids that aren’t ready to learn in 

the first place. They come to school insecure. Their homes are not 

safe. Possibly they may not even have a home. They may be moving every 6 months. They are hungry quite often. Sometimes they 

don’t have medical care. 

How in the world can we evaluate teachers—so this is a question 

to all of you. How would you take this into account when teachers 

are evaluated? How do we measure a teacher’s progress when that 

teacher is provided a classroom of kids that are in real need? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. I will jump in. 

So while it is absolutely true, everything that you said, that kids 

come to school with very different needs and that those needs impact then the classroom environment, excellent teachers are able to 

advance learning with kids regardless of the challenges that they 

are bringing to school. We see that again and again. 

Ms. WOOLSEY. Excuse me, one kid at a time. What if they get 

a classroom of half the kids in the class move every 6 months or 

they have got 13 different languages in the classroom? One excellent teacher is going to be able to balance all of that without any 

help from us? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. I think there is a difference when you talk about 

measurement between moving, in which case you have a measurement challenge between—— 

Ms. WOOLSEY. All right. I am talking about what that does to the 

kids. So I am not talking about—okay. 

Mr. HUFFMAN. I personally believe, yes, we see it all the time. 

So it is not accidental, again, that the Teach for America teachers 

are actually outperforming other teachers, even though they have 

the toughest classrooms. Part of that is because we are doing 

value-added. So we are not just saying, where do you wind up at 

the end of the year? We are saying, how far do you advance your 

kids over the course of the year? So is it hard work? Yes. But, on 

the other hand, we only want people in classrooms serving highneed kids who believe they have the locus of control to move those 

kids’ student achievement. 

Mr. BOASBERG. Maybe I could speak to Colorado. In Colorado, we 

measure growth as well. Last year, of the five schools in the whole 

State of Colorado, 2,000 schools, that grew the most, four were in 

Denver. Three of those schools, the student body were more than 

90 percent of those students came from families in poverty. We 

have too many schools that perform extraordinarily well with students who come from families in poverty. So I have seen it done 

in classroom after classroom, in school after school. 

Is it challenging? Yes. But the alternative, that somehow we do 

not evaluate, do not have accountability for our teachers who teach 

our highest-need students, to me is a far more concerning alternative. 

Ms. WOOLSEY. Absolutely. So let’s go on to you, Mr. Cicarella. 

Tell us, I am sure, building on what these two gentlemen said, 
79 

what do we do? Why are those classrooms able to make up that difference? What do we provide? 

Mr. CICARELLA. You are right. I mean, the extenuating circumstances do count. While I agree excellent teachers make a difference, I am going to disagree that if you are an excellent teacher 

you are going to overcome all these impediments. Kids don’t come 

to school. You can’t teach them. You can’t teach an empty chair. 

Some of them have so many severe problems—we don’t need to go 

into those—that the last thing on their mind—I taught algebra and 

I taught reading in eighth grade. That kid could care less about my 

polynomial lesson when he has got all kinds of things going on at 

home. That is just the reality of it. 

I prepare my lessons diligently, I care about them, and I do the 

best can. But if they are not engaged and if they have so many 

things facing them, they are just not going to be—no one is going 

to break through that. 

So to your question as to what do you about it, we do need to 

look at the legitimate reasons. And so the wraparound services are 

really important. That is part of what we have for school reform 

in New Haven, is that we have to address those issues. Because 

you can be the best teacher in the world, as I said, but, again, some 

of those impediments are so severe that no one is going to break 

through those. 

Ms. WOOLSEY. Okay. Thank you. 

Ms. Walsh, you have just a little bit of time. 

Ms. WALSH. I think that they have spoken well to this issue. I 

do think the question before us is what is our alternative. 

Ms. WOOLSEY. No, I am not suggesting we don’t do it. I am suggesting it will be an investment that has to be made. Otherwise, 

we will be leaving groups of kids out and/or evaluating teachers on 

something that is quite impossible. So we need a lot of help in that 

regard. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman KLINE. I thank the gentlelady. Her time has expired. 

I want to again thank the witnesses for being here, for excellent 

testimony, and really being engaged in the questions and answers. 

I am going to recognize Mr. Miller for his closing remarks. And, 

by agreement, he is going to roll at least one more question into 

those remarks. So stand by. Mr. Miller. 

Mr. MILLER. I just have kind of a general observation. I appreciate your observation on the observation. 

Mr. BOASBERG—I think I got it right—yeah, this is yours. 

Mr. BOASBERG. It is, yes. 

Mr. MILLER. On the teacher and student behaviors and teacher 

behaviors and on the learning behaviors, on those parts of the 

graphs, you have for a distinguished teacher the students are observed pursuing their own strategies and ideas, students are observed supporting each other, and persevering and solving problems. Students are observed encouraging each other to work harder. 

You have here for students, student mediate diverse opinions or 

approaches and devise their own. Students approach tasks and responses in highly original and applied ways. Students are creative 

problem solvers and think about systems, not just isolated parts. 
80 

Most teachers would tell me that this is all inconsistent with 

teaching to the test. I assume you still have annual tests? 

Mr. BOASBERG. We do. So thank you for the observation, and I 

appreciate you bringing it up. 

If I could respond, I don’t see there is any inconsistency at all. 

I think that all of us in the community care very deeply can our 

students learn to read, write, and do math. To me, that is just the 

threshold that all of our students need in order to contribute to our 

society and have jobs. And I think those tasks do measure that. 

Those are important to our students. Can they learn to read, write, 

and do math? 

At the same time, our schools all have real aspirations to prepare 

our kids for the 21st century, to be good citizens, to be problem 

solvers, to be innovative, to be creative; and we care very deeply 

about those things. That is what our parents tell us. 

In Colorado, it is a school choice State. As a parent, you can send 

your child to any school anywhere in the State so long as there is 

room. We need to be able to make sure that we are offering to our 

students rich classrooms that really develop the whole child, and 

I see absolutely no inconsistency at all. In fact, what we see when 

we have teachers who are developing those higher order thinking 

skills, the problem solving skills, the creativity, innovation, collaboration, that students are taking command of their own learning, 

being original. They are the ones who are scoring best on reading, 

writing, and math. 

So, in our experience, there has been absolutely no inconsistency 

with caring deeply about students to be able to read, write, and do 

math and, at the same time, caring deeply about the whole child 

and fostering the critical thinking, the creativity, the innovation 

skills that I as a parent care so deeply about, and all of our parents 

care very deeply about. 

Mr. MILLER. Anyone else? 

Mr. HUFFMAN. I would just agree. I don’t think teaching to the 

test works in advancing test scores the way people think. I think 

that it is actually the mediocre teacher that teaches to the test, and 

it is the strong teacher that teaches a robust set of skills that 

winds up being demonstrated in advanced test results. 

Mr. MILLER. I probably have been an outlier in that I insisted 

for a long time that it was an excuse and not a result. I am very 

encouraged that we would consider these attributes in evaluation. 

Because I think these attributes mirror a modern workplace much 

more so than most schoolrooms and where students do collaborate, 

where workers collaborate, where people work across grades or 

work across schools or get together with other schools and start to 

figure out solutions, as opposed to the right fact. The facts are on 

Google. The question is, can you pull them together and come up 

with a solution to what may be complex in fourth grade or seventh 

grade or eighth grade and can you do it with others? I think that 

tells us more about getting people ready for a modern economy and 

modern democracy, if you will. So I appreciate that. Thank you 

very much. 

Thank you very much for all your testimony this morning. 

Chairman KLINE. I thank the gentleman and identify myself 

with all of his closing remarks. 
81 

Mr. MILLER. You heard it here first. 

Chairman KLINE. You heard it here first. 

Mr. MILLER. Probably never again. 

Chairman KLINE. Maybe, maybe never again. 

Mr. MILLER. The gentleman gets the right to revise and extend 

his remarks. 

Chairman KLINE. In this case, I won’t. I do agree. I am heartened by what we have heard here today. I think you are making 

fantastic progress. We are going to continue to grapple with our 

role, with Washington’s role in what you are doing. I can tell you 

that, as a very minimum, we want to make sure that you are able 

to continue with what you are doing and the successes that we are 

seeing. 

Again, as I said earlier, your testimony is fantastic. You have 

been very involved and engaging witnesses. I thank you for that. 

There being no further business, the committee stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:13 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

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