Review Backs New Tool for Principal Evaluation

This from Ed Week:

An examination of how to size up the performance of principals has found that one evaluation method is best suited for judging the effectiveness of school leaders: the Vanderbilt Assessment of Leadership in Education.

Created in 2006 and just now widely available for districts to purchase, the assessment, called VAL-ED , is the newest of the principal instruments in the review conducted by Matthew Clifford and Christopher Condon, researchers with Learning Point Associates, a nonprofit educational consulting firm based in suburban Chicago. ("Assessment to Rate Principal Leadership to Be Field-Tested," Jan. 16, 2008.)

Mr. Clifford said the impetus for the review was the growing recognition that principals, second only to classroom teachers, affect student learning. Districts need as much information as possible to make high-stakes decisions about whom they hire as principals, how or whether they should invest in their improvement...

The VAL-ED is a multi-rater approach to measuring the effectiveness of school leadership behaviors known to influence teacher performance and student learning. The VAL-ED measures core components and key processes. Core components refer to characteristics of schools that support the learning of students and enhance the ability of teachers to teach.

Key processes refer to how leaders create those core components.

•High Standards for Student Learning—There are individual, team, and school goals for rigorous student academic and social learning.

•Rigorous Curriculum (content)—There is ambitious academic content provided to all students in core academic subjects.

•Quality Instruction (pedagogy)—There are effective instructional practices that maximize student academic and social learning.

•Culture of Learning & Professional Behavior—There are integrated communities of professional practice in the service of student academic and social learning. There is a healthy school environment in which student learning is the central focus.

•Connections to External Communities—There are linkages to family and/or other people and institutions in the community that advance academic and social learning.

•Performance Accountability—Leadership holds itself and others responsible for realizing high standards of performance for student academic and social learning. There is individual and collective responsibility among the professional staff and students.

Key Processes Refer to How Leaders Create Those Core Components

•Planning—Articulate shared direction and coherent policies, practices, and procedures for realizing high standards of student performance.

•Implementing—Engage people, ideas, and resources to put into practice the activities necessary to realize high standards for student performance.

•Supporting—Create enabling conditions; secure and use the financial, political, technological, and human resources necessary to promote academic and social learning.

•Advocating—Promotes the diverse needs of students within and beyond the school.

•Communicating—Develop, utilize, and maintain systems of exchange among members of the school and with its external communities.

•Monitoring—Systematically collect and analyze data to make judgments that guide decisions and actions for continuous improvement.