District-Determined Measures

Background

Massachusetts adopted new regulations in 2010 requiring districts to use District-Determined Measures and state test score data to create Student Impact Ratings for all licensed educators as part of the educator evaluation system. These state regulations stemmed from federal mandates that evidence of student growth be a “significant” factor in educator evaluations.

After strong opposition, Congress passed the Every Student Succeeds Act which repealed the requirement. However, state regulations linking test scores to evaluations still remain.

District-Determined Measures and MCAS growth scores in the educator evaluation system was initiated in the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s application for federal Race to the Top grant funds. The DESE’s commitment to this strategy was reinforced in the state’s successful 2012 application for a waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

Under the 2013 educator evaluation regulations, which include DDMs, at least two measures of educator effectiveness based on student outcomes were to be developed for every licensed educator.

For those who taught English language arts and/or math in MCAS-tested grades, one of these DDMs must measure trends and patterns in in their students’ Student Growth Percentiles. A trend would consist of at least two years of data.

DDMs were to be used to determine an educator’s Student Impact Rating of low, moderate or high. That rating informed the length and content of the educator’s plan, most notably whether it would be a one- or two-year self-directed growth plan.

After strong opposition to this federal mandate across the country, Congress passed in 2015 the Every Student Succeeds Act which repealed the requirement. However, state regulations linking test scores to evaluations still remain.

The MTA maintains that the selection or creation of DDMs is a mandatory subject of bargaining. Some districts have bargained DDMs, in others it’s ongoing. Some districts and locals are in agreement that this effort is time-consuming and unproductive, so they have sought to minimize the requirement.

DDM Mandate Repeal Effort

MTA and AFT Massachusetts worked to eliminate the Student Impact Rating mandate and DDM requirements included in educator evaluation regulations. When the federal Every Student Succeeds Act was passed, eliminating federal requirements on educator evaluations, MTA and AFT MA prepared a position paper, presented the critique to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education and worked to include a provision in the FY17 budget to remove the mandate from evaluation requirements.

After a BESE meeting in June 2016, the state education commissioner developed proposals for regulatory changes. The MTA received the proposals in September, 2016. MTA and AFT MA disagreed with the proposed regulatory changes because they failed to address the most significant problems caused by the invalid Student Impact Rating system and continued the misguided practice of judging educators based on student test scores. MTA members submitted public comments against the proposed changes to the educator evaluation system.

From September to November, 2016, MTA and AFT MA worked to develop alternative proposals that could be accepted by all stakeholders.

While some progress toward a solution came out of discussions with associations representing superintendents and principals, the commissioner’s insistence on identifying each teacher’s impact on student learning and using it to inform a rating made it impossible to come to a resolution. The superintendents’ and principals’ associations were now supporting the commissioner’s proposed changes.

The BESE introduced their proposed amendments to the regulations on November 29, 2016.

Rather than just eliminate the impact rating, the Commissioner proposed replacing it with a nearly identical “Student Learning Indicator,” which would become one of the indicators in Standard 2 and part of an educator’s summative rating. This would increase the impact of student test scores on an educator’s evaluation. The MTA and AFT Massachusetts opposed both the current system and the proposed amendments. A better solution would have been to simply eliminate the Student Impact Rating.

Flawed Policy

In most instances, the flawed elements of the previous regulations have been replicated in the new regulations – just with different names.

MTA and AFT-MA believe that the new regulations adopted on February 28, 2017, do not address the problems with the Student Impact Rating that have been identified by educators. In most instances, the flawed elements of the previous regulations have been replicated in the new regulations — just with different names. The new regulations allow invalid and unreliable student learning measures to count even more than they did. While the Student Impact Rating was separate from the summative rating, the new Student Learning Indicator is placed directly in Standard 2, where it can have a disproportionate impact on the educator’s summative evaluation. A rating below Proficient on Standard 2 prevents an educator from receiving an overall Proficient rating. Using student test scores as the basis for such high-stakes ratings is methodologically unsound and educationally harmful. Further, the new regulations do not explain how the Student Learning Indicator relates to the existing Student Learning Goal, an ambiguity that will lead to confusion and implementation headaches.

The MTA maintains that the new regulations are a mandatory subject of bargaining.