Serious flaws in APPR scoring bands exposed

By carolcorbettburris, June 22, 2013

Recently Commissioner King imposed an APPR plan on New York City teachers. When you look at the plan, you see that the scoring bands for the first two categories,(student growth), are dramatically different from those used this year to evaluate all of NYS teachers with APPR plans. For example, this year’s scoring band range for Ineffective is 0-2. Yet NYC teachers will have an Ineffective range of 0-12. Likewise, this year Effective starts at 9, but for NYC teachers it will start at 15.

Why? Because the score band that is being used for our APPR scores has serious problems that cannot be addressed through negotiations.  For example, if you get the rating of ‘developing’ in all three categories and the scores are on the low end of developing, you will be rated INEFFECTIVE overall. 

Despite the fact that this is known to SED, they have yet to honestly address it or speak about it. What is the right thing to do? Have this year’s APPR scores not count, and certainly not have them shared with parents. It is yet to be seen if the NYC “fix” will even work. I know this stuff can be hard to understand, (which is probably what SED is counting on), but this needs to come to light.

You can read my explanation of the detail here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/06/18/new-problems-with-new-yorks-teacher-evaluation-plan-found/