Sad Story in L.A.

An ongoing investigation by the Los Angeles Times has spotlighted a topic usually veiled in secrecy: teacher effectiveness.

The first in a series of articles looks at the “value added” impact of individual elementary school teachers in the Los Angeles schools over seven years. Among a host of disturbing facts: The schools unwittingly subjected more than 8,000 third-to-fifth-graders to one of the district’s least effective math and English teachers at least two years in a row.

Sadly, that kind of school experience often predicts uneven academic results. A Brookings study found that after a single year, students assigned to the top quarter of teachers ended up about ten percentile points ahead of those assigned to the lowest performing teachers. Other research tells us that kids assigned to ineffective teachers for three consecutive terms see a drop in reading achievement—from the 60th percentile in third grade to the 42nd percentile in fifth grade.

What’s more, we know the flip side: Strong teachers can make a life-changing difference. According to the Brookings study, having a top-quartile teacher four years in a row would significantly close the black-white achievement gap. Meanwhile, the news from L.A. brings us back to basics: Teachers matter, and policymakers should use every lever to assign the best ones to the kids who need them most.