Report Card
To view the new report card visit: http://teacherprepreportcard.tn.gov/
As Tennessee works to raise the bar for students and be more transparent with achievement data, it is also taking strides to bolster teacher preparation programs.
Today the state is launching a redesigned online report card for its teacher training programs that gives detailed information about new teachers' readiness for success in the classroom.
State leaders say the data should help training program operators better prepare fledgling teachers, as national and state-level research shows teacher quality is the strongest in-school factor influencing students' academic success.
"Tennessee is the fastest-improving state in the nation for student achievement. But to hold this trajectory, we must continue to ensure high expectations for students, schools and teachers, including how we train and prepare our newest teachers," said Sara Heyburn Morrison, executive director of the Tennessee Board of Education.
The report card evaluates programs based on the profiles of their students, the ability of their graduates to find and keep teaching jobs, and how effective their teachers are in the classroom. The report was launched by the state board of education in partnership with the Tennessee Department of Education and the Tennessee Higher Education Commission.
The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga's School of Education earned a score of two out of a possible four, which is based on data from 399 students who graduated in 2014 and 2015.
UTC has struggled for years to prepare teachers to succeed in the classroom, but the School of Education's new director believes the program is at its restart point.
Renee Murley took the helm in July and has been implementing changes she believes will boost the school's score in coming years.
UTC graduates are employed at near the state average: 64.3 percent are teaching in a Tennessee public school within a year of being licensed. And 93.2 percent of those teachers are still in classrooms the following year, which is also near the state average.
But UTC graduates fell short in classroom observation scores, with just 30 percent being rated "above expectations" or "significantly above expectations." All told, 84.2 percent of grads were rated "at expectation" or higher. The state average is 54.4 percent and 93.2 percent, respectively, according to the report card.
Murley said that data is incomplete because observation data is based on just 60 percent of the graduates, not including those who teach out of state or in private schools. She also said teacher effectiveness calculations account for just 18 percent of graduates. Many K-3 teachers' effectiveness scores are not included because their students do not take standardized tests.
Murley said she hopes to receive more data from the report card moving forward, to get a more complete picture of how UTC-trained teachers are performing.
"UTC's School of Education believes in accountability and [we] know we have a responsibility to our community and most importantly to the children within our community," Murley said. "However, we want specific, complete and accurate data in order to appropriately address areas of improvement within our program. We cannot make improvements without data."
State officials said even though some categories don't include all graduates during the two-year span of the report card, it does provide a snapshot or sampling that should be representative of the whole.
McKenzie Manning, spokeswoman for the state board of education, said this is the first time teacher effectiveness data and observation scores for graduates of a teacher preparation program have been reported, and it was something school districts requested.
The report card also is supposed to help school districts and teacher preparation programs work in a strategic partnership to help new teachers be effective.
Nearly 30 percent of Hamilton County Schools teachers are considered least effective by state measures. The district's ratio of least-effective teachers is almost three times the state average, and twice that of the Knox, Metro Nashville and Shelby County school systems.
State Education Commissioner Candice McQueen said better training and recruitment will help Tennessee put more high-quality teachers in schools.
"This revamped report card will help to strengthen the educator pipeline and better equip our school districts to partner with educator preparation providers so all of our teachers are ready on day one," McQueen said.
The Hamilton County Schools district gets most of its teachers from UTC, and Murley said working with the school district is a priority. The two are developing a program to give each UTC graduate a mentor teacher for three years.
UTC also hopes to graduate teachers with the high-demand endorsements that Hamilton County Schools need, such as English as a Second Language credentialing. That is a measure also evaluated on the state's report card.
Looking ahead, Morrison hopes the redesigned report card will help spark increased efforts to improve teacher prep.
"[The report is] a tool to inform conversations locally and at the state level," she said.
Contact staff writer Kendi A. Rainwater at 423-757-6592 or krainwater@timesfreepress.com. Follow on Twitter @kendi_and.