Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

This paper comparatively examines the development of education policy and the politics of implementing edTPA in four US states: New York, Georgia, Texas, and Oklahoma. edTPA is a “multiple-measure assessment system aligned to state and national standards – including Common Core State Standards and the Interstate Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (InTASC)”, which was developed through a collaborative effort between SCALE at Stanford University and the AATCE. Pearson is the operational partner in the implementation of edTPA throughout the US, which complicates the agenda and implementation of edTPA. These four states were purposefully selected based on their contrasting edTPA implementation experiences (New York and Georgia) as well as their contextually similar, but structurally contrasting approaches to educational policy development and implementation (Texas and Oklahoma).

Two research questions drive this study: (1) What is the underlying policy model or script for developing and implementing edTPA at the state level?, and (2) How and why is the underlying policy model modified in both process and content given changes in state education context? As edTPA continues to be adopted by states and institutions, and as high-stakes are attached to this assessment, the key questions revolve around the interpretation, manipulation, and introduction of state education policy to not only facilitate and institutionalize edTPA as part of both state-accredited Educator Preparation Programs (EPPs) in universities and colleges, but also institutionalize edTPA as a core component of state-mandated teacher certification requirements.

A comparative case study design is employed, using both quantitative and qualitative data. In this comparative case study we analyze and synthesize the similarities, differences and patterns for New York and Georgia regarding implementation timeline, stakeholder involvement, coordination between state education agencies and university-based educator preparation programs, and the development/implementation of state-level policy regarding edTPA. We approached the comparative case study in a similar way between Texas and Oklahoma, but focused more on the stages of edTPA implementation and the state-level processes that support it since these are ongoing cases rather than historical. By examining these two pairs of cases and then across all four cases, we were able to identify four general components in the underlying model of state education policy relevant to edTPA implementation. Given the various stages of development and differing contexts of these four states during their edTPA-related policy development and implementation, there are also several structural and contextual elements, which modify elements of the underlying model as edTPA continues to move forward.