Where Are the "Best" Teachers?

No to beat a dead horse, but the buzz about the article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune this week about Minneapolis Public Schools infuriates me.  It infuriates me not only because it is a direct insult to myself, my profession and my abilities as a teacher as well as my choices of where to work and my work ethic and so much more, but because it is taking complex information and making it overly simplified.  I posted a link on facebook to a very well written response to the article from a teacher at Bethune Elementary in Minneapolis, which is the school mentioned in the article as being the poorest school and having the worst teachers.  Of course, the writers of the article base that statement on an extremely complex teacher/school rating system which I am not even going to begin to go into now.

What I want to explain is the simple data and look at what the data really tells us about teachers and schools and who truly is 'the best'.  On the Minnesota Department of Education website, in the data and analytics section you can down load excel spread sheets of any assessment data for any school and compare the data yourself.  Being the data geek that I am, I know and use this site often.  So, I pulled the data for the MCA Reading tests for 2013 and 2014.  For those of you who don't know, the MCA is the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment, a standardized test given to every public school student in Minnesota every spring.  Important to note here too is that the MCA went through a major overhaul in 2013 to line up with the Common Core standards which are much more rigorous than the previous state standards.  Basically, the MCA got a heallovaot harder from 2012 to 2013.  (If you want more of an explanation of this, let me know, I am happy to go into it...but its rather complex and not very interesting.  Just trust me, the test got harder.  A lot harder.)

I looked at Bethune's test scores for 2013 and 2014 and compared them with Hale's.  Before I get into the data, here's some information about the two schools taken directly from their websites and Minneapolis Public School's website.

Bethune's population is 100% free and reduced lunch-100% of the students live in poverty.  At Hale, only 10% do.  At Bethune, 4% of the population (which is already 100% poverty) is also English Language Learners-kiddos whose first language is not English.  At Hale, its 2%.  Bethune's Special Education population makes up 22% of its already free and reduced lunch population.  Hale has 10% Special Education kids.

So, just looking at that, what does it tell you?  The teachers at Bethune are working with a much more complex, challenging, lower academic level, lower economic level population than Hale.  They are essentially starting the race ten minutes after Hale begins.

Now, let me tell you what I found.  I looked at the 3rd graders MCA scores from 2013 and the 4th graders MCA scores from 2014 to see what growth was made in both schools.  Notice I am focusing on GROWTH not how many kids meet or exceed standards.  If you start out with a class where every single student you have is two or three years below grade level, you will not get all of them caught up in one year when dealing with the social, emotional, physical, and developmental needs of the kids as well.
******Note on test scores, the first number is the grade level, the second number is the actual test score ranging from 0-99 with being Meeting Standards.  Again, I am more than happy to explain more of this to you, but I am not going to go into it now...************

The average score for Bethune's 2013 3rd graders MCA Reading was 325.2. In 2014 those same kids, now 4th graders, had an average score of 428.1 which means they increased an average of 3.1 points.  So, they GREW, 3.1 points.  

The average score for the 2013 4th graders was 428.1.  In 2014 as 5th graders, their average was 534.9, an increase of 6.8 points on average.  Again, GROWTH.  And that is BIG growth.

There was growth, but according to the powers that be, the growth wasn't enough because the kids are still below standards.  

Now, lets look at Hale, the school with the stronger population.   In 2013 Hale's 3rd graders average score was 366.4.  That says the majority of the students are above grade level.  In 2014 as 4th graders, the average score was 462.0.  Again way above grade level.  But...the scores dropped by 4.4 points.  Dropped.  As in, got lower.  But to the powers that be, that doesn't matter because the kids are above the standards.

So the teachers with the poorest families, most challenging behaviors, most inconsistent attendance, lowest academic levels, actually made the most growth...

I leave you with the question I started with...where are the "best" teachers? 

Yes I know I only looked at one class in two different schools...my point is, shouldn't we change the way we define successful teachers and schools based on growth?  Shouldn't every single child in every single school be expected to grow academically each school year regardless of where they start out?  Growth matters.  When I have some extra time, I may do the same comparison with other schools...but that's a big undertaking for a crazy single mom working in an inner city school....so it might be a long time coming... :)