News Release - Educator performance reports show majority of Colorado educators are effective or higher

Feb. 6, 2017

Educator performance reports show majority of Colorado educators are effective or higher

Educator evaluation system working to help teachers and principals continually improve their practice

DENVER – Performance reports for Colorado teachers and principals released today to the public for the first time show the majority of educators received evaluation ratings of “effective” or higher.

A total of 88 percent of Colorado teachers received an overall rating of “effective” or “highly effective” according to the metrics released today, while 83 percent of Colorado principals also had similarly high ratings. About 4 percent of teachers received ratings of “partially effective” or less and nearly 8 percent of teachers in Colorado did not receive a rating. 

The release of the Educator Effectiveness Metrics is mandated by the 2010 state law called the Great Teachers and Leaders Act, SB10-191, which requires every Colorado teacher and principal be evaluated every year with specific data points related to those evaluations submitted to the state Department of Education. The data being released today is from the 2014-15 school year. (The lag in reporting is due to the timeframe in which districts submit ratings to CDE.)

“The purpose of the Great Teachers and Leaders Act was to support our teachers and leaders in improving their practice through regular, meaningful feedback,” said Colorado Education Commissioner Katy Anthes. “These metrics act as a tool to help educators and principals understand where they can improve, but even more important than the ratings are the meaningful conversations that are taking place during evaluations to help lift up our teachers and principals so that all students can achieve their academic potential.”

To meet statute and State Board of Education rules, four metrics for teachers and four for principals are being released to the public, though 14 metrics are collected on teachers and 16 on principals. The metrics are not intended to be used to compare districts, as local educator evaluation systems vary across the state. In addition, the publicly reported metrics reveal only how teachers and principals are doing as a group at the school, district and state level. Protections are in place to ensure educator privacy.

The four publicly released educator effectiveness metrics are:

• Effectiveness Ratings: This metric shows the overall evaluation ratings, in aggregate, including the percent of educators with ratings ranging from “highly effective” and “effective” to “partially effective” and “ineffective.”
• Quality Standards: This metric shows the evaluation ratings in six standards for teachers and seven for principals. The teacher standards include how well they know content, how they establish a learning environment, their leadership capabilities and student growth.
• Alignment: This metric shows the connection between the performance of the teacher/principal on teaching and leadership-related standards and student growth on statewide assessments and other local measures.
• Equitable Distribution: This metric shows the percentage of “effective” or higher educators in schools and/or districts with varying levels of students in poverty, racial minority students, and English Language Learners.

All educator effectiveness metrics for the 2014-15 school year are available in SchoolView. 

• View the state, district and school level educator effectiveness metrics in SchoolView in Data Center.
• See step by step instructions of how to access local district and school educator effectiveness metrics.