The Sensitivity of Teacher Value-Added Scores to the Use of Fall or Spring Test Scores

2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (5) ◽  
pp. 335-349
Author(s):  
Allison Atteberry ◽  
Daniel Mangan
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Model ◽  
Test Scores ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
Statewide Testing ◽  
Grade 3 ◽  
Value Added Measures

Papay (2011) noticed that teacher value-added measures (VAMs) from a statistical model using the most common pre/post testing timeframe–current-year spring relative to previous spring (SS)–are essentially unrelated to those same teachers’ VAMs when instead using next-fall relative to current-fall (FF). This is concerning since this choice–made solely as an artifact of the timing of statewide testing–produces an entirely different ranking of teachers’ effectiveness. Since subsequent studies (grades K/1) have not replicated these findings, we revisit and extend Papay’s analyses in another Grade 3–8 setting. We find similarly low correlations (.13–.15) that persist across value-added specifications. We delineate and apply a literature-based framework for considering the role of summer learning loss in producing these low correlations.

The Implications of Summer Learning Loss for Value-Added Estimates of Teacher Effectiveness

2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Seth Gershenson ◽  
Michael S. Hayes
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Effectiveness ◽  
Test Scores ◽  
Value Added ◽  
The United States ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
School Year ◽  
Value Added Models ◽  
Nationally Representative

School districts across the United States increasingly use value-added models (VAMs) to evaluate teachers. In practice, VAMs typically rely on lagged test scores from the previous academic year, which necessarily conflate summer with school-year learning and potentially bias estimates of teacher effectiveness. We investigate the practical implications of this problem by comparing estimates from “cross-year” VAMs with those from arguably more valid “within-year” VAMs using fall and spring test scores from the nationally representative Early Childhood Longitudinal Study–Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K). “Cross-year” and “within-year” VAMs frequently yield significant differences that remain even after conditioning on participation in summer activities.

School’s Out: The Role of Summers in Understanding Achievement Disparities

2020 ◽  
pp. 000283122093728 ◽  
Author(s):  
Allison Atteberry ◽  
Andrew McEachin
Keyword(s):  
Language Arts ◽  
English Language ◽  
Basic Research ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
Data Set ◽  
School Year ◽  
Measurement Artifacts

Summer learning loss (SLL) is a familiar and much-studied phenomenon, yet new concerns that measurement artifacts may have distorted canonical SLL findings create a need to revisit basic research on SLL. Though race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status only account for about 4% of the variance in SLL, nearly all prior work focuses on these factors. We zoom out to the full spread of differential SLL and its contribution to students’ positions in the eighth-grade achievement distribution. Using a large, longitudinal NWEA data set, we document dramatic variability in SLL. While some students actually maintain their school-year learning rate, others lose nearly all their school-year progress. Moreover, decrements are not randomly distributed—52% of students lose ground in all 5 consecutive years (English language arts).

The Impact of Summer Learning Loss on Measures of School Performance

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 468-491 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew McEachin ◽  
Allison Atteberry
Keyword(s):  
School Quality ◽  
Value Added ◽  
School Level ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Education Policies ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
School Year ◽  
Value Added Models ◽  
The Impact

State and federal accountability policies are predicated on the ability to estimate valid and reliable measures of school impacts on student learning. The typical spring-to-spring testing window potentially conflates the amount of learning that occurs during the school year with learning that occurs during the summer. We use a unique dataset to explore the potential for students’ summer learning to bias school-level value-added models used in accountability policies and research on school quality. The results of this paper raise important questions about the design of performance-based education policies, as well as schools’ role in the production of students’ achievement.

scholarly journals Learning Landscapes: The Education Spectrum from Camps to Classrooms

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 4-13
Author(s):  
Lance Ozier
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Peer Relations ◽  
Sense Of Belonging ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Summer Camps ◽  
Return To School ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
Noncognitive Factors

Summer camps and school classrooms are intersecting institutions, both complementing the learning lives of young people. Each summer at camp children enjoy recreational, artistic, nature, and adventure programs that can help them acquire important skills that are not always or explicitly taught in the classroom. Campers practice sportsmanship, positive peer relations, social skills, and a sense of belonging. These activities develop the mindsets and noncognitive factors necessary to reduce summer learning loss and increase academic achievement when campers once again return to school as students in the fall. Including summer camps as a landscape on the education spectrum is essential to shaping more appropriate versions of teaching and learning—versions open to embracing and valuing all settings and the links that exist between these spaces.

The One about Summer Learning Loss

2021 ◽  
pp. 192-193
Author(s):  
Edward Watson ◽  
Bradley Busch
Keyword(s):  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
The One

scholarly journals Measurement Matters: Perspectives on Education Policy from an Economist and School Board Member

2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 167-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Lang
Keyword(s):  
No Child Left Behind ◽  
Test Scores ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Education Community ◽  
Enormous Amount ◽  
School Board Member ◽  
Value Added Measures ◽  
Nclb Act ◽  
Summary Data

One of the potential strengths of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act enacted in 2002 is that the law requires the production of an enormous amount of data, particularly from tests, which, if used properly, might help us improve education. As an economist and as someone who served 13 years on the School Committee1 in Brookline Massachusetts, until May 2009, I have been appalled by the limited ability of districts to analyze these data; I have been equally appalled by the cavalier manner in which economists use test scores and related measures in their analyses. The summary data currently provided are very hard to interpret, and policymakers, who typically lack statistical sophistication, cannot easily use them to assess progress. In some domains, most notably the use of average test scores to evaluate teachers or schools, the education community is aware of the biases and has sought better measures. The economics and statistics communities have both responded to and created this demand by developing value-added measures that carry a scientific aura. However, economists have largely failed to recognize many of the problems with such measures. These problems are sufficiently important that they should preclude any automatic link between these measures and rewards or sanctions. They do, however, contain information and can be used as a catalyst for more careful evaluation of teachers and schools, and as a lever to induce principals and other administrators to act on their knowledge.

scholarly journals More than Just Summer Reading: The Shift to "Summer Learning"

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 3
Author(s):  
Christine Caputo ◽  
Christy Estrovitz
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Academic Achievement Gap ◽  
Summer Learning ◽  
Summer Vacation ◽  
Summer Reading ◽  
School Year ◽  
Summer Enrichment ◽  
Historical Sites

Yay summer! At the end of every school year, children are excited to begin their summer vacations. During this time off many students also look forward to a summer enrichment camp, traveling with their families, visiting local museums and historical sites, or many other experiences.For many others, especially children and teens from low-income communities, their summer vacation is not full of learning opportunities. Research over the last several years indicates that children who do not participate in learning experiences over the summer year after year have an academic achievement gap that grows throughout the elementary and middle school years. This summer learning loss can add up to about two-thirds of the gap in reading achievement by ninth grade.

scholarly journals Using No-Stakes Educational Testing to Mitigate Summer Learning Loss: A Pilot Study

2014 ◽  
Vol 2014 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franklin Zaromb ◽  
Rachel M. Adler ◽  
Kelly Bruce ◽  
Yigal Attali ◽  
JoAnn Rock
Keyword(s):  
Pilot Study ◽  
Summer Learning Loss ◽  
Educational Testing ◽  
Learning Loss ◽  
Summer Learning
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