Measures of Effective Teaching: 4 - District-Wide Files, 2008-2014 (ICPSR 34798)

Version Date: Sep 24, 2018

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Principal Investigator(s):
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Series:

https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR34798.v2

Version V2 ()

  • V2 [2018-09-24]
  • V1 [2014-12-16] unpublished
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Alternate Title

MET 4 - District-Wide Files, 2008-2014

Summary

The Measures of Effective Teaching Project (MET)

The MET project is based on two premises: First, to a significant extent a teacher's evaluation should depend on his/her students' achievement gains; second, any additional components of the evaluation (e.g., classroom observations) should be valid predictors of student achievement gain.

Student achievement was measured in two ways -- through existing state assessments, designed to assess student progress on the state curriculum for accountability purposes, and supplemental assessments, designed to assess higher-order conceptual understanding. The supplemental assessments used were Stanford 9 Open-Ended Reading Assessment in grades 4 through 8, Balanced Assessment in Mathematics (BAM) in grades 4 through 8, and the ACT QualityCore series for Algebra I, English 9, and Biology.

Panoramic digital video of classroom sessions were taken of participating teachers and students, teachers submitted commentary on their lessons (e.g., specifying the learning objective) and then trained raters scored the lesson based on classroom observation protocols using the following five observation protocols:

  • Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS), developed by Robert Pianta, University of Virginia
  • Framework for Teaching, developed by Charlotte Danielson
  • Mathematical Quality of Instruction (MQI), developed by Heather Hill, Harvard University, and Deborah Loewenberg Ball, University of Michigan
  • Protocol for Language Arts Teaching Observations (PLATO), developed by Pam Grossman, Stanford University
  • Quality Science Teaching (QST) Instrument, developed by Raymond Pecheone, Stanford University

A subset of the videos also are being scored using an observational protocol developed by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS).

Close to 3,000 teacher volunteers from across the following six, predominantly urban, school districts participated in the MET project: Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, Dallas Independent School District, Denver Public Schools, Hillsborough County Public Schools, Memphis City Schools, and the New York City Department of Education. Participants teach math and English language arts (ELA) in grades 4-8, Algebra I, grade 9 English, and high school biology.

The District-Wide Files

The district wide files are comprised of one data file per district for each of the 2008-2009, 2009-2010, 2010-2011, 2011-2012, 2012-2013, and 2013-2014 school years, for a total of thirty-six data files. Each file contains information on each student in the school district including student demographic variables, such as race, age and gender, specialty student status variables such as free lunch, English language learner, and gifted and talented program participation, and student-level test rankings for math and reading. Also included are the aggregate means of those student demographic, specialty status, and test score variables for each teacher.

Two versions of the SAS code used for creating the original value-added measures for teachers in each district are also provided with the data files. The non-aggregated version of the code uses the individual math and reading test rankings for each of a teacher's students to calculate predictive score estimates. The aggregated version of the code uses the mean math and reading test rankings for all of that teacher's students to calculate estimates.

Citation

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Measures of Effective Teaching: 4 - District-Wide Files, 2008-2014. Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2018-09-24. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR34798.v2

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Funding

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Subject Terms

Geographic Coverage

Smallest Geographic Unit

School District

Restrictions

The Measures of Effective Teaching Longitudinal Database (MET LDB) is restricted from general dissemination; a Confidential Data Use Agreement must be established prior to access. Researchers interested in gaining access to the data can submit their applications via ICPSR's online Restricted Contracting System accessible via the "Access Restricted Data" tab on the ICPSR study homepage.

Applicants will be required to:

  • Submit IRB approval/exemption documentation;
  • Scan and email the completed Confidential Data Use Agreement, signed by the Primary Investigator and an Institutional Representative;
  • Pay annual access fee and renew yearly for continued data access.

Please visit the MET LDB Web site for more information.

Distributor(s)

Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research
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Time Period(s)

2009 -- 2014

Date of Collection

2009 -- 2014

Data Collection Notes

  1. Most students have two records in each district-wide file, one for ELA and one for Math. Tests for both ELA and Math are recorded on every row, but the teacher ID and other variables differ. Users should always use the variable SUBJECT to select which test scores to analyze on a particular record.
  2. Value-added estimates from the MET LDB will not exactly match the value-added scores appearing in the MET analytical files. In response to concerns of the school districts, ICPSR has modified the district-wide data to protect the confidentiality of individual students. All changes to the data were designed solely to mask the identities of students, and their impact on value-added estimates is very small. When the RAND scripts are used to compute value-added estimates, the correlation coefficients between estimates derived from the original data and the modified data are 0.98 or higher.

  3. Users should note that all files with a suffix of "_v1" are new files available through the current update.

  4. Participating academic institutions include Dartmouth College, Harvard University, Stanford University, University of Chicago, University of Michigan, University of Virginia, and University of Washington. Participating non-profit organizations include Educational Testing Service, RAND Corporation, and the New Teacher Center. Participating education consultants include Cambridge Education, Teachscape, and Westat. The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards and Teach For America supported the project and have encouraged their members to participate. The American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association were involved in discussions about the MET project and supported the research.

  5. For additional information about The Measures of Effective Teaching (MET) Project, please visit the ICPSR MET LDB Web site, as well as the MET Project Data Web site hosted by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
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Study Purpose

The MET Study addressed several related research questions: How reliable and valid are the specific measures of teaching effectiveness under study? Do the various measures identify distinctive dimensions of teaching effectiveness, and if so, what dimensions are identified? What measures of effective teaching are empirically related to student learning gains? What does effective teaching look like, and how does it compare to less effective teaching? For example, what is the distribution of teacher scores on measures of effective teaching, and how much difference is there in teacher knowledge scores, teaching practice scores, and student outcome scores among teachers at different points in the distribution of measures of effective teaching? Can multiple sources of data on teachers and their teaching be combined to develop a set of fair, valid, and reliable indicators of teaching quality for use in teacher evaluation systems intended to rank teachers for personnel decision making and to promote teachers' professional learning and development?

Study Design

Teachers at targeted grade levels (4th-9th grade) and in targeted subject areas (English Language Arts, Math and Biology) were recruited from schools in six school districts. Video was captured of these teachers' classroom sessions and these videos were scored using multiple measures to rate teaching method and classroom environment. Multiple assessment instruments and standardized test scores were used to gather student achievement data. Multiple surveys were administered to gather student, teacher and principal opinion on topics such as classroom instruction as well as classroom, school and working environment. Year Two of the study included a teacher randomization.

Sample

The MET Study began with a process of "opportunity" sampling that took place during July - November 2009 and resulted in six, large school districts volunteering to participate in the study. The process of opportunistic sampling then continued as elementary, middle, and high schools within each district were recruited into the study. Once schools were recruited, opportunity sampling continued as teachers (at targeted grade levels and subject areas) within these schools volunteered for the study. The sampling process resulted in 2,741 teachers from 317 schools in six large school districts being recruited into the first year of the study. Attrition in the teacher sample in Year Two of the study resulted from schools that dropped out of the study (11 schools; 60 teachers). Additionally, individual teachers dropped out when they left their school or district, began teaching a different subject or grade, lost interest in the study, or became ill. Overall, the Year Two sample of teachers included 2,086 teachers in 310 schools. Of the 582 4th and 5th grade teachers in Year Two, the majority continued to be subject-matter generalists who taught English Language Arts (ELA) and Mathematics to a single class of students, although the sample also included a small number of subject matter specialists (who taught ELA or Mathematics to more than one class section of students) and teachers who volunteered only to have their teaching of a single subject be studied. Of the 841 middle-school grade teachers in Year Two, about half continued to be teachers of ELA in grades 6-8, and the other half teachers of Mathematics at these grades. Of the 479 9th grade teachers in Year Two, about a third were teachers of 9th grade English, another third were teachers of 9th grade Algebra I, and another third were teachers of 9th grade Biology.

Time Method

Longitudinal: Panel

Universe

Teachers and students within the six participating school districts.

Unit(s) of Observation

Teachers, Students

Data Source

Administrative data were gathered from each of the six participating school districts.

Data Type(s)

Mode of Data Collection

Response Rates

2,746 teachers began Year 1 of the MET project and 1,868 completed Year 2 of the MET project.

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Original Release Date

2013-09-01

Version History

2018-09-24 All district-wide data files have been updated with "ICPSR_GLOBAL_IDs" that link students and teachers across all data files in all years. District-wide data used to compute "value-added" measures have been added for school years 2011-12, 2012-13, and 2013-14. Variable names have been harmonized across all years and districts.

2018-02-15 The citation of this study may have changed due to the new version control system that has been implemented. The previous citation was:
  • Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Measures of Effective Teaching: 4 - District-Wide Files, 2008-2014. ICPSR34798-v2. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2018-09-24. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR34798.v2

2014-12-16 A versioning system was installed in the file names.

2014-10-03 Updating public codebooks to match restricted codebooks.

2014-10-02 A series wide update to assure that files distributed through internal systems are current with those turned over.

2014-03-13 Added the 2010-2011 value added code files and made updated the readme file.

2014-03-06 Released the 2010-2011 District-Wide Files for all six districts, as well as the 2010-2011 value-added code files.

2013-10-31 Fixed some labeling issues in the value-added SAS code files.

2013-10-17 2013-09-25 Released value-added code files.

2013-09-24 2013-09-23 Standardized missing values in all data files. Clarified variable labels and value labels in all data files.

2013-09-01 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:

  • Performed consistency checks.
  • Created variable labels and/or value labels.
  • Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
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Notes

  • The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.

  • One or more files in this data collection have special restrictions. Restricted data files are not available for direct download from the website; click on the Restricted Data button to learn more.