Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

A number of studies demonstrate that teacher effectiveness is a significant contributor to student learning (see, for example, Chetty, Friedman, & Rockoff, 2014). Such knowledge has spurred widespread interest in understanding how to foster teacher effectiveness. Meanwhile, a number of stakeholders—such as educators, researchers, and policymakers—have expressed concerns about the quality of the building blocks that are used to develop effective teachers: preservice teacher preparation and inservice induction programs. For example, three of five graduates from educator preparation programs reported that their preservice training did not prepare them for “classroom realities” (Levine, 2006, p. 32) and new teachers have been found to be less effective than more experienced teachers (see, for example, Isenberg, et al., 2016). One challenge of teacher preparation and induction programs is how to provide prospective and novice teachers with enough exposure to high-quality models of accomplished teaching such that they know what their instruction should resemble.

In 2012, the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (National Board) partnered with five teacher preparation programs and eight teacher induction programs to develop the Accomplished Teaching, Learning, and Schools (ATLAS) resource. ATLAS enables preservice and inservice teachers to become exposed to examples of accomplished teaching. The National Board is equipped to do this given that they have established and maintained definitive standards of effective teaching, much like physicians’ board standards. Since 1987, more than 112,000 teachers have attained National Board Certified Teacher (NBCT) status and numerous studies have shown that NBCTs are more effective, on average, than their noncertified counterparts (see, for example, Cowan & Goldhaber, 2016). The ATLAS resources is a case library in which each case consists of a video recording of an NBCT providing classroom instruction, along with their written commentary of the recorded lesson.

In 2015, a two-year study commenced to examine the effect of ATLAS use on pre-service and early-career teacher outcomes (perceptions of preparedness, self-efficacy, and reflective practice, and edTPA performance) relative to non-ATLAS users. The general study design is to use teacher-level propensity score matching to identify non-ATLAS users who are similar to ATLAS users on observable characteristics (e.g., ACT/SAT score, race/ethnicity). The matching is conducted separately for the preservice and early-career samples (e.g., preservice ATLAS users are matched to preservice non-ATLAS users) across universities/districts within the same state.

By the time of the fall conference, the researchers will be able to present final study results for the effects of ATLAS use on preservice and early-career teacher outcomes. Interim findings suggest that preservice teachers who used ATLAS had more confidence in their preparation to teach than preservice teachers who did not use ATLAS. A series of hierarchical linear models revealed that after one year of ATLAS use preservice teachers reported significantly higher levels of preparedness to teach; self-efficacy related to instructional strategies, classroom management, and student engagement; and reflective practice.