This working paper investigates how empirical Bayes shrinkage, an approach commonly used in implementing teacher accountability systems, affects the value-added estimates of teachers of students with hard-to-predict achievement levels, such as students who have low prior achievement and receive...

New Leaders for New Schools, a nonprofit organization committed to training school principals, is heading an initiative that offers financial awards to effective educators. This report details the value-added model Mathematica developed to identify effective schools in the Memphis City school...

This working paper uses urban school district data to investigate whether including track indicators or accounting for classroom characteristics in the value-added model is sufficient to eliminate potential bias resulting from the sorting of students into academic tracks. Accounting for two...

Teacher induction programs are designed to support new teachers and reduce teacher turnover. Comprehensive teacher induction, however, goes beyond traditional induction by relying on carefully selected and trained full-time mentors and also includes an intensive curriculum involving...

Teacher induction programs are designed to support new teachers and reduce teacher turnover. Comprehensive teacher induction, however, goes beyond traditional induction by relying on carefully selected and trained full-time mentors and also includes an intensive curriculum involving...

Researchers often presume that it is better to use administrative data from grades 4 and 5 than data from grades 6 through 8 for conducting research on teacher effectiveness that uses value-added models because (1) elementary school teachers teach all subjects to their students in self-contained...

This report presents the methods used to identify effective schools and teachers for a consortium of over 140 charter schools in 17 states and the District of Columbia during the second year of the project.