Teachers who Influence high Academic Performance in Students
Teachers have an unenviable role in shaping the destiny of their students through strategies that engage their interests and influence intellectual performance. Now a new ground breaking study has tracked 2.5 million students over a 25 year period to show the correlation between high test scores, from as early as kindergarten, with success rates in early adulthood.
The “value added” method, which measures a teacher’s effect on a students’ scholastic performance in the course of a year, seems to be the best determinant in guiding a student through to university; this, according to studies done collectively from two leading universities.
Raj Chetty, Economist at Harvard University, states that if a teacher is found to systematically raise a student’s test score relative to the prior year, that teacher is called a high value-added teacher. Conversely, if a teacher is found to systematical lower the test score of a student relative to the prior year, that teacher is called a low value-added teacher.
This means students assigned to high value-added teachers are likely to become successful adults over the long-term. They are more likely to progress through the top colleges and settle into higher income jobs. In contrast, the impact of a low value-added teacher on students is one of uncertainty in career path and personal growth. Based on the study, such students are more likely to become teenage parents, without a tertiary education or potential for higher earnings.
These are strong claims that affect educational policies in the United States and parents in general, particularly in a struggling economy. Therefore should these studies be taken as a clear representation of the facts? Chetty, explains that economists are not able to run systematic experiments as scientists can, however their methods of identifying features of data corresponds well with scientific experiments..
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