Principal Strategies to Improve Teacher Effectiveness

• In Event: District and State-Level Approaches to Teacher Improvement

Abstract

Principals are central to efforts at promoting teacher quality, but they are marginalized in the teacher effectiveness literature (Author, 1994; Author, 2011; Harris, Rutledge, Ingle, & Thompson, 2010). We know little about the strategies principals employ to support teacher improvement. In this paper, we explore how New York City principals, guided by a coherent theory of change, develop and execute systems to improve teaching. We analyze principals’ agency and strategic actions in implementing four policies intended to improve teaching: teacher evaluation, early career mentoring, professional development time, and tenure.

Theoretical framework

Research provides evidence that strategic management of the school’s teaching force is among the most important mechanisms by which principals can improve school outcomes (Cohen-Vogel, 2011; Author, 2012a). Strategic principals identify and coordinate resources in service of shifting the composition of the teacher workforce and creating opportunities for capacity building (Bryk et al., 2010; Cohen-Vogel et al., 2013).

Methods & Data Sources

We employ extensive administrative data on teachers, principals, and school climate in New York City combined with a survey of all New York City middle school principals executed in summer 2016 (N=494, response rate=52 percent) and in-depth interviews with 45 survey respondents. The administrative data include teacher and principal-level data, as well as school-level evaluation ratings and teacher-by-year value-added data for all teachers in tested grades and subjects as an outcome measure. We employed a variety of analytic techniques including factor analysis, multivariate regression, and ordered logistic regression. Multiple raters transcribed and coded all interviews. We created principal-level memos focusing on individual approaches to improving teaching and drafted cross-case memos highlighting different theories of change.

Results

Principals vary in the extent to which they hold a coherent theory of change for improving teacher effectiveness. We identified four groups of principals. The first group clearly articulate goals and express a strong sense of agency about their ability to meet those goals. Across data sources, these principals delineate a series of strategic actions that change the composition of teachers and support teacher development. Thus their actions are consistent with and in service of their goals. The second group do not clearly specify goals for their schools, and the third group have clear goals but do not feel they can reach those goals for myriad reasons (e.g., the perceived supply of quality teacher applicants, the demographics of students, district superintendent mandates). Our fourth group have goals and agency but lack a robust set of strategic actions to achieve those goals. Survey responses indicate principal agency varies with school characteristics, and strategic actions vary with principal agency.

Scholarly significance

Our analysis focuses on four policies, which are prominent features of district discussions and improvement plans nationwide. Understanding how principals engage with these policies designed to improve teacher effectiveness, and the degree to which there is synergy in the implementation of these policies, is vital. Building an empirical base about the mechanisms through which principals make consequential decisions about teachers is a requisite first step.

Authors

• Julie Jackson Cohen, University of Virginia

• Susanna Loeb, Stanford University

• Luke C. Miller, The Urban Institute

• Anisah Waite, University of Virginia

• James H. Wyckoff, University of Virginia