Using State Longitudinal Data for Leader Preparation Program Accountability and Performance Feedback: Promises and Challenges

• In Event: Making Sense of Principal Preparation Program Evaluations

Abstract

States increasingly are interested in using information from state longitudinal data systems, multiple-measure educator evaluation systems, and other data sources to hold leader preparation programs accountable and provide them with performance feedback to improve the training they provide. This paper reports on research undertaken by the Tennessee Education Research Alliance (TERA), a research-practice partnership between Vanderbilt University and the Tennessee Department of Education, to explore the use of the state’s personnel, educator effectiveness, and survey data for these purposes. It updates an analysis by Grissom, Mitani, and Woo (2018) to consider both the potential benefits of using statewide data on educators for program accountability and feedback purposes and the challenges inherent in such an undertaking. In particular, it documents the challenges of interpreting “program effects” in light of competing signals from analyses of different outcomes, faulty inference from failing to take district and school influences on leader performance into account, and complications introduced by the principal labor market, such as potentially long lags for many leaders between program completion and entrance into school leadership positions.

Author

• Jason A. Grissom, Vanderbilt University