The Education Value-Added Assessment System: Methodological Issues and Implications for Policy and Practicality

• In Event: 30.039 - Exploring Reliability and Validity Measures in Student Assessment

Abstract

The Education Value-Added Assessment System (EVAAS), the value-added model (VAM) sold by the business analytics software company SAS Institute Inc., is advertised as offering “precise, reliable and unbiased results that go far beyond what other simplistic [value-added] models found in the market today can provide.” In this study, researchers investigated these claims by conducting analyses on over 1,700 teachers’ EVAAS results from the Houston Independent School District (HISD). Researchers found the EVAAS to perform, overall, in line with other VAMs in terms of validity and reliability, although it yielded possibly more biased value-added estimates than other VAMs. Hence, results do not support SAS’s aforementioned claim about providing relatively more “precise, reliable, and unbiased results that go far beyond…other simplistic models.”

Authors

• Tray Geiger, Arizona State University

• Audrey Amrein-Beardsley, Arizona State University