Skip to main content

Currently Skimming:

7 The Impact of Board-Certified Teachers on Student Outcomes
Pages 154-181

The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.


From page 154...
... By reshaping the teaching field, expanding the opportunities available to teachers, and articulating the standards for accomplished teaching, the national board envisioned having a significant impact on the quality of teachers and teaching and, consequently, on student learning (National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, 1991)
From page 155...
... Using Achievement Test Scores as the Outcome Variable Nearly all the research discussed in this chapter uses student scores on standardized achievement tests as the measure of the impact of board certification. Using test scores in this way has a long history in research, and in the current federal accountability system established under the No Child Left Behind Act, test scores are the primary indicator of whether schools are making "adequate yearly progress." However, test scores as measures of achievement are not universally accepted as measures of student learning.
From page 156...
... Many of the skills that the national board requires teachers to demonstrate are not reflected by what is evaluated on standardized achievement tests. For example, to become board certified in the middle childhood generalist area, teachers need to demonstrate that they can establish a caring and stimulating learning environment, that they respect individual differences, that they use a rich and varied collection of materials in their teaching, that they provide multiple paths to learning, and that they provide students with situations when they can apply what they have learned (National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, 2001c)
From page 157...
... Nonrandom Assignment of Students to Teachers If students are not randomly assigned to teachers, the effects of board certification may be either underestimated or overestimated to the extent that teachers are systematically assigned students who are below or above average. For example, if board-certified teachers are typically assigned above-average students, comparing test scores may suggest board-certified teachers are more effective than nonboard-certified teachers when in fact all that is true is that the students they have been assigned have higher
From page 158...
... . Student fixed effects models operate by allowing each student to serve as his or her own control.
From page 159...
... Other studies included school fixed effects, which are analogous to the student fixed effects model discussed above. School fixed effects models control for all stable characteristics of the school, whether or not direct measures of those characteristics are available.
From page 160...
... As with student fixed effects models, they cannot control for characteristics that vary over time, such as when the school district boundaries are altered so that the composition of the student body changes markedly. School fixed effects models require at least two years of data for each school, and preferably three or more years of data, and therefore rely on the existence of largescale longitudinal data sets.
From page 161...
... This clustering needs to be considered in designing the research approaches because students in a class are generally more like each other than students in different classes. Students in a classroom share a common learning environment and a common teacher, which causes their test scores to be somewhat positively correlated.
From page 162...
... The findings are sensitive to model specification, how comparison teachers are identified, the timing of the comparison -- before certification, after certification, or during the certification process -- and the nature of the test score used as the outcome. In reviewing these studies, we attempted to get an overall sense of the evidence about the relationship between board certification and student learning and the extent to which the findings are consistent across studies.
From page 163...
... The results for the nonexperimental sample showed the same patterns, but the effect sizes were much smaller. Studies Using Statistical Adjustments to Account for Nonrandom Assignment Six of the seven studies used fixed effects models and/or covariates to adjust for differences in school, teacher, and student characteristics
From page 164...
... 164 ASSESSING ACCOMPLISHED TEACHING TABLE 7-1  Studies Examining the Relationship Between Board Certification and Student Achievement Grades/ Study Content Area(s) Years State/District Cantrell et al.
From page 165...
... Differences between NBCTs and unsuccessful applicants were significant. - NBCTs Education Students of NBCTs Standard errors - Current applicants production made highest gains did not account - Unsuccessful function followed in order for nesting; when applicants by those taught by corrected, effect sizes - Nonparticipants nonparticipants may not be statistically and those taught significant.
From page 166...
... math NC: Wake and Charlotte–Mecklenberg NOTE: The outcome measure for all studies was the state's achievement test used for accountability purposes. Harris and Sass used two different outcome measures, but results reported here are for the state accountability test.
From page 167...
... NBCTs = national board-certified teachers.
From page 168...
... . All six compared gains in test scores of students taught by board-certified teachers to gains in scores for students taught by nonboard-certified teachers who were other­wise qualified to pursue board certification (i.e., were licensed to teach and had at least three years of teaching experience)
From page 169...
... For the norm-referenced test, the effects associated with board certification were   At the high school level, students are tested only once in each subject, so models of student fixed effects over time cannot be estimated. Instead, the authors estimated fixed-effects models of student achievement across subjects.
From page 170...
... Overall, the effect sizes were smaller than those estimated using North Carolina data. Harris and Sass' examination of the impact of board certification by the various stages of the process yielded a complex set of results depending on the content area and the test used as the outcome measure.
From page 171...
... Sanders, Ashton, and Wright's disaggregation by grade level reduced sample sizes, reducing power and making it more difficult to identify significant effects, irrespective of the clustering issue. Synthesis of the Research Findings The literature review above was intended to describe findings from research on the relationship between national board certification and student test scores.
From page 172...
... Two strategies were used to estimate score increases (gain score model and covariate model) and two methods were used to handle preexisting group differences (student fixed effects and school fixed effects)
From page 173...
... For North Carolina, future board-certified teachers appear to be more effective before becoming board certified, raising test scores 5 percent more in math and 2 percent more in reading than other teachers. The decline in effectiveness reported in other studies is evident during the application year.
From page 174...
... (.006) Model gain score gain score   Student fixed effects no yes   School fixed effects no no aStandard errors appear in parentheses.
From page 175...
... The magnitude of the effects differs from study to study, however, with the effect sizes reported by Cantrell et al. slightly larger than those reported in the other studies.
From page 176...
... TABLE 7-4  Summary of Effect Sizes: Successful National Board Applicants Versus Unsuccessful Applicants Study Math Reading Model Cantrell et al. .219 .194 Random assignment of students to teachers, lagged achievement Cavaluzzo .100 -- School fixed effects, gain score Goldhaber and .090 .050 Student fixed effects, gain Anthony score Sanders, Ashton, and .134 .038 HLM, b lagged achievement Wrighta Sanders, Ashton, and .102 .032 HLM, teacher random Wrightc effects, lagged achievement aFrom Sanders, Ashton, and Wright, Table 3A, average effect sizes across grades for board certified versus failed.
From page 177...
... To help evaluate the magnitude of these effects, we investigated the effect size for a hypothetical advancedlevel certification process that relies solely on value-added estimates derived from student test scores. We refer to this hypothetical process as "pure value-added certification." To our knowledge, no one has seriously proposed a pure value-added certification process, but there is substantial policy interest in valueadded approaches, and many people have proposed approaches to certification or licensure that involve some role for value-added measures.
From page 178...
... Comparison of the two ­effect sizes indicates that national board certification captures one-fifth of the value-added effect that would be produced by a pure value-added certification process. Taken together, the results from our additional analyses lead us to articulate three findings and a conclusion: TABLE 7-5  Certification Effects for a Pure Value-Added Certification Effect Size for Effect Size for Selection Rule Teachers Who Pass Teachers Who Fail Top 25% 0.32 –0.11 Top 50% 0.20 –0.20 Top 75% 0.11 –0.32 NOTE: Effect sizes estimated from the teacher quality distribution estimate of 0.25 standard deviation of student value added for a 1 standard deviation difference in teacher quality in Texas (see Hanushek, Kain, O'Brien, and Rivkin, 2005)
From page 179...
... in absolute terms, but when considered in terms of teacher value-added contributions to achievement, they are substantively meaningful. Studies of Other Student Outcomes Our search of the literature identified one study that measured the effects of board certification on students using outcomes other than achievement test scores.
From page 180...
... The second path is to examine other student outcomes. Test scores are a narrow conception of student learning, and the standardized test data currently available are primarily scores on tests designed to measure mastery of state content standards, not teaching skills.
From page 181...
... Researchers pursuing such studies should work with the national board to obtain the information needed to study the effects of teachers who successfully obtained board certification as well as those who were unsuccessful. Recommendation 7-2: We encourage studies of the effects of board-certified teachers on outcomes beyond scores on standardized tests, such as student motivation, breadth of achievement, attendance rates, and promotion rates.


This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More information on Chapter Skim is available.