Using the TxVAAS to Improve Teacher Effectiveness: Investigating the Research-Situated “Truths” Behind TxVAAS Claims

Abstract

At the time of this study, the Texas Value-Added Assessment System (TxVAAS) was being piloted throughout Texas to hold teachers more accountable for their effects on students' achievement (i.e., teachers’ value added). It is still being used by districts throughout Texas today. Using a framework informed by the<em> Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing</em>, researchers conducted a content analysis of the marketing and research-based claims asserted about the TxVAAS, to (a) examine the “truth” of each claim to (b) help others critically consume the marketing claims using (c) nonproprietary, peer-reviewed literature. Given that the more popular, and also proprietary version of the TxVAAS—the Education Value-Added Assessment System—continues to be sold and marketed to other states and districts in similar ways, researchers deemed it critical to intervene before other states and districts might blindly trust the marketing and research-based claims presented.