Do Accountability Policy Sanctions Influence Teacher Motivation? Lessons From Chicago’s Low-Performing Schools

2007 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 594-630 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kara S. Finnigan ◽  
Betheny Gross
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Student Outcomes ◽  
Teacher Motivation ◽  
Professional Status ◽  
Theoretical Assumption ◽  
Low Performing Schools ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Accountability Policy ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Policy Mechanisms

The federal No Child Left Behind Act and previous performance-based accountability policies are based on a theoretical assumption that sanctions will motivate school staff to perform at higher levels and focus attention on student outcomes. Using data from Chicago, this article draws on expectancy and incentive theories to examine whether motivation levels changed as a result of accountability policies and the policy mechanisms that affected teacher motivation. Through a combination of qualitative and quantitative data, the authors found that the value teachers placed on their professional status and their goals for students focused and increased their effort, but low morale had the potential to undercut the sustainability of teachers’ responses.

The Rhode to Turnaround: The Impact of Waivers to No Child Left Behind on School Performance

2017 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 555-586 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shaun M. Dougherty ◽  
Jennie M. Weiner
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Rhode Island ◽  
Student Mobility ◽  
Performance Measure ◽  
Fuzzy Regression ◽  
Continuous Performance ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Fuzzy Regression Discontinuity Design ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact

Using data from Rhode Island, and deploying a fuzzy regression-discontinuity design, this study capitalizes on a natural experiment in which schools, in accordance with the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) waivers, were sorted into performance categories based on a continuous performance measure. The lowest performing schools were then mandated to implement interventions. We find that schools implementing fewer interventions perform no differently than comparable schools without such requirements. Additionally, schools just required to implement more interventions performed worse than comparable schools implementing fewer. Finally, we find differences in the probability of student mobility from lower performing schools.

School Accountability

2018 ◽  
pp. 520-550
Author(s):  
Morgan Polikoff ◽  
Shira Korn
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
The United States ◽  
School Accountability ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Accountability Systems ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Policy Choices ◽  
Accountability Policy ◽  
Improve Student Achievement ◽  
Every Student Succeeds Act

This chapter summarizes the history and effects of standards-based school accountability in the United States and offers suggestions for accountability policy moving forward. It analyzes standards-based accountability in both the No Child Left Behind Act and the Every Student Succeeds Act, and discusses the effects of accountability systems. The authors argue that school accountability systems can improve student achievement, but that unintended consequences are possible. How accountability systems are designed—the metrics and measures used and the consequences for performance—has both symbolic and practical implications for the efficacy of the system and the individuals affected. Synthesizing what is known about the design of school accountability systems, the authors propose policy choices that can improve the validity, reliability, transparency, and fairness of these systems.

scholarly journals Unscheduled School Closings and Student Performance

2008 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 316-338 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dave E. Marcotte ◽  
Steven W. Hemelt
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Student Performance ◽  
Adequate Yearly Progress ◽  
Early Spring ◽  
Late Winter ◽  
School Closings ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Instruction Time ◽  
Reading And Math ◽  
Using Data

Do students perform better on statewide assessments in years in which they have more school days to prepare? We explore this question using data on math and reading assessments taken by students in the third, fifth, and eighth grades since 1994 in Maryland. Our identification strategy is rooted in the fact that tests are administered on the same day(s) statewide in late winter or early spring, so any unscheduled closings due to snow reduce instruction time and are not made up until after the exams are over. We estimate that in academic years with an average number of unscheduled closures (five), the number of third graders performing satisfactorily on state reading and math assessments within a school is nearly 3 percent lower than in years with no school closings. The impacts of closure are smaller for students in fifth and eighth grades. Combining our estimates with actual patterns of unscheduled closings in the last three years, we find that more than half of schools failing to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) in third-grade math or reading, required under No Child Left Behind, would have met AYP if schools had been open on all scheduled days.

scholarly journals Niezamierzone skutki stosowania testów wysokiej stawki. Lekcja z amerykańskiej reformy NCLB

1970 ◽  
pp. 39-64
Author(s):  
Alicja Zawistowska
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Standardized Tests ◽  
Core Curriculum ◽  
High Stakes Testing ◽  
Exit Exams ◽  
Unintended Effects ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Teaching Standards ◽  
Accountability Policy

Educational decision makers willingly draw on solutions adopted in other countries. It was also the case in Polish educational reform started in late 90s. Since the introduction of the reform, Poland joined countries whose educational system is divided into three levels, each ending with an exit exams and core curriculum is set to teaching standards. The exams seem to be the most important element of the Polish reform. While the designers of educational policies are often inspired by the experiences of other countries during the planning phase, they are less willing to learn from them when it comes to predicting outcomes of the reform. A good case to analyze potential consequences of high-stakes testing is United States, where standardized tests have been administered since the beginning of the era of mass education. In this paper I will analyze the effects of the last, most controversial federal reform, commonly known as No Child Left Behind introduced in 2002. Findings of the study might be used to predict potential unintended effects of using the high stakes tests for accountability policy. The article addresses the problem of test scores inflation as well as the factors which may accelerate it.

Changes in School Engagement as a Function of No Child Left Behind: A Comparative Interrupted Time Series Analysis

2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (4) ◽  
pp. 721-760 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna J. Markowitz
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Cross Sections ◽  
School Engagement ◽  
Interrupted Time Series ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Interrupted Time Series Analysis ◽  
Active Involvement ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Every Student Succeeds Act

After the adoption of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), a host of anecdotal evidence suggested that NCLB diminished students’ school engagement—a multidimensional construct that describes students’ active involvement and commitment to school and encompasses students’ thoughts, behaviors, and feelings about school. Using data from repeated cross-sections of the Children of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, this study draws on methodological innovations from research linking NCLB to academic outcomes to explore this possibility. Findings are suggestive of an immediate NCLB-based increase in engagement that diminished and ultimately became negative over time. Because engagement predicts both achievement and socio-emotional well-being, researchers and policymakers should work to ensure that the Every Student Succeeds Act facilitates accountability systems that promote engagement.

scholarly journals Accountability as a Design for Teacher Learning: Sensemaking About Mathematics and Equity in the NCLB Era

2016 ◽  
Vol 53 (3) ◽  
pp. 382-408 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilana Seidel Horn
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Teacher Learning ◽  
Educational Inequality ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Learning Design ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Accountability Policy ◽  
Urban Educators ◽  
Design Perspective

Using a learning design perspective on No Child Left Behind (NCLB), I examine how accountability policy shaped urban educators’ instructional sensemaking. Focusing on the role of policy-rooted classifications, I examine conversations from a middle school mathematics teacher team as a “best case” because they worked diligently to comply with the NCLB. Using discourse analysis, I identify instances of torque in their conversations: when educators’ compliance with accountability logics pulled them away from humanistic goals of education in ways that stood to exacerbate existing educational inequality. This article contributes to documentation on unintended consequences of accountability policies while identifying features that contribute to torque.

School-to-School Variation in Disciplined Inquiry

2011 ◽  
Vol 46 (6) ◽  
pp. 1553-1583 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean Kelly ◽  
Richard Majerus
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
School Quality ◽  
Large Body ◽  
School Level ◽  
Low Performing Schools ◽  
The Public ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
School Differences

In recent years No Child Left Behind has provided new labels to supposedly high- and low-performing schools and has identified large numbers of schools as low performing. Are school-to-school differences in the quality of instruction offered as great as the public is led to believe? Using the disciplined inquiry typology of Newman, Marks, and Gamoran, we examine whether variation in observable indicators of school quality correspond to real differences in instruction between schools. Consistent with the large body of research on school effects we find very modest school-level variation in the prevalence of disciplined inquiry.

Teacher Workforce Developments: Recent Changes in Academic Competitiveness and Job Satisfaction of New Teachers

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 310-332 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Master ◽  
Min Sun ◽  
Susanna Loeb
Keyword(s):  
Job Satisfaction ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
College Graduates ◽  
Urban School Districts ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Alternative Pathways ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Teacher Workforce ◽  
Using Data

Policy makers and school leaders are perennially concerned with the capacity of the nation's public schools to recruit and retain highly skilled teachers. Over the past two decades, policy strategies including the federal No Child Left Behind Act and alternative pathways to teaching, as well as changes in the broader labor market, have altered the context in which academically skilled college graduates choose whether to enter teaching, and, if so, where to teach. Using data from 1993 to 2008, we find that schools nationwide are recruiting a greater share of academically skilled college graduates into teaching, and that increases in teachers’ academic skills are especially large in urban school districts that serve predominantly nonwhite students. On the other hand, the increase in the share of academically skilled teachers coincides with the lower likelihood of nonwhite teachers being employed. Once teaching, nonwhite teachers report substantially lower job satisfaction than other teachers. The issue of how to recruit and support an academically skilled and diverse teacher workforce remains pressing.

scholarly journals State-level autonomy in the era of accountability: A comparative analysis of Virginia and Nebraska education policy through No Child Left Behind

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Richard Ruff
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
State Level ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Assessment Model ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Accountability Policy

Following the 1983 A Nation at Risk report and culminating in No Child Left Behind (NCLB), states designed and implemented accountability policies to evaluate student achievement. External assessments of these policies identified substantial variability in the level of stakes associated with each system. This paper presents a comparative analysis of accountability policy prior to and during implementation of NCLB. Using the Virginia Standards of Learning and the Nebraska School-based Teacher-led Assessment and Reporting System, it explores the role of the historical and political context in shaping assessment policy through the lenses of the processes, conditions, and consequences of the policy process. It concludes that the influence of Nebraskan historical culture embedded the role of local action in the design and interpretation of accountability policy, which when combined with the collaborative efforts of the board of education, legislature, and executive branch, resulted in an atypical assessment model involving actors across the policy process. The Virginia experience was characterized by a strong political identity of centralization, yielding a top-down accountability system that constrained resources and opportunities for transforming policy at local levels. Findings demonstrate how comparable policy intentions for accountability are transformed due to existing state-level conditions and local policy culture.

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