Superintendent Rick Smith asks a question during a school board meeting in this Oct. 28, 2014, photo.NASHVILLE — Tennessee’s largest teachers union filed a federal lawsuit on Thursday that challenges how the state uses standardized test scores to evaluate teachers.
The lawsuit filed in Nashville focuses on those teachers whose evaluations are based substantially on standardized test scores of students in subjects they do not teach.
That’s more than half of the public school teachers in Tennessee, according to the lawsuit.
“Hallelujah,” said Sandy Hughes, president of the Hamilton County Education Association, in response to the lawsuit.
She previously taught Latin and French at Ooltewah High School. Since those subjects aren’t included in standardized testing, Hughes said her evaluation was based on the school’s overall test scores.
Hamilton County Schools Superintendent Rick Smith said gym teachers, art instructors and librarians are other employees that “will get a score based on the school score.”
Improving standardized test scores is harder in schools where parents don’t have that much education and don’t supply books and other learning materials at home, Hughes said.
“In schools with high concentrations of poverty, it’s very difficult to get scores up,” she said.
The TEA has long argued that the Tennessee Value-Added Assessment System, or TVAAS, data shouldn’t be relied upon because it’s a statistical estimate and could lead to flawed evaluations.
Plaintiffs in the lawsuit say their overall evaluation scores dropped after schoolwide TVAAS estimates were used to calculate their scores. One person allegedly was denied a bonus and another lost eligibility to be recommended for tenure.
The lawsuit states the evaluation practice violates “plaintiffs’ substantive due process and equal protection rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.”
“Educators are not opposed to being evaluated,” said TEA President Barbara Gray. “We just want it to be done in a way that actually reflects the quality of our individual work and contributions to student success.”
Smith said Hamilton County teachers are evaluated in six categories: planning and preparation for learning, classroom management, monitoring, delivery of instruction, assessment and follow-up, family and community engagement, and professional responsibilities. Those scores count for at least half of their overall evaluation.
Gov. Bill Haslam has proposed legislation to change teacher evaluations. One change would lower the weight on TVAAS in nontested subjects from 25 to 15 percent.
Currently, 35 percent of an educator’s evaluation is comprised of student achievement data.
Haslam said Thursday that he didn’t have a comment about the lawsuit. But he said he was aware of teachers’ concerns after talking to a number of them around the state.
“It just felt fair for us on the nontested subjects to drop that down,” he said.
Last year, state lawmakers passed legislation that prohibits standardized test scores from being tied to teacher licensing. Haslam signed the measure.
Staff writer Tim Omarzu contributed to this report.