New York City Teacher Data Initiative - Value-Added Project

The VARC Center is helping the New York City Department of Education update and manage its recently-developed models of teacher-level 'value-added' contribution to student achievement, as measured by state standardized tests. This project includes generating reports providing value-added data to support the New York City Teacher Data Initiative.

Since the beginning of its Children First strategy, one priority for the NYC DoE has been to improve the effectiveness of its teaching force at raising student achievement. Research has consistently shown that teachers vary in their effect on student learning and that the differences can have significant consequences for students’ success or failure in school and later in life. The DoE has supported several academic research efforts designed to understand the variation in teacher effectiveness as measured by student standardized test scores and isolate policy actions that could be taken to improve student achievement.