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Standardized tests are unfair metrics for teacher evaluations.

As W. James Popham, former President of the American Educational Research Association, notes, “standardized achievement tests should not be used to determine the effectiveness of a state, a district, a school, or a teacher. There’s almost certain to be a significant mismatch between what’s taught and what’s tested.” [81]

“An assistant superintendent… pointed out that in one of my four kindergarten classes, the student scores were noticeably lower, while in another, the students were outperforming the other three classes. He recommended that I have the teacher whose class had scored much lower work directly with the teacher who seemed to know how to get higher scores from her students. Seems reasonable, right? But here was the problem: The “underperforming” kindergarten teacher and the “high-performing” teacher were one and the same person,” explains Margaret Pastor, Principal of Stedwick Elementary School in Maryland. [82]

As a result, 27 states and D.C. have stopped using standardized tests in teacher evaluations. [79] [80] [88]

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