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New federally-compiled graduation rates for 47 states and the District of Columbia left many states reeling this week as more rigorous and uniform standards highlighted wide achievement gaps and lower numbers than previously reported.

While the U.S. Department of Education said the new rates can’t be compared to previous numbers, officials said the graduation rates provide an accurate ranking of states. Georgia, which has previously boasted graduation rates of about 80 percent, found itself near the bottom, with a graduation rate of 67 percent, even lower than neighboring states Alabama and Mississippi. “It’s disappointing,” Tim Callahan, spokesman for the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “We were using sort of a feel-good calculation.”

And in Ohio, where state-calculated graduation rates have been climbing for several years, the state’s interim superintendent Michael Sawyers told the Newark Advocate that he’s “surprised and somewhat disheartened” to see that the graduation rate for black, Hispanic and low-income students is far lower than the 85 percent rate for white students. New Jersey, which had the highest graduation rate in the nation in a ranking by Education Week in June, tied with six other states for 12th place. “I’m not sure there is any material difference between being in the top 12 versus the top eight,” said State Education Commissioner Chris Cerf to The Record. “It shows New Jersey is doing extremely well compared to the rest of the nation, and has significant room to improve.”

The move to a uniform system reflects a broader trend in education reform, as states also launch the new Common Core State Standards, which will allow more accurate comparisons of academic achievement. Under the new graduation metrics, all state scores are based only on the percent of students who graduate in four years, and data is adjusted for students who drop out or do not earn a regular diploma. Previously, states or outside agencies often included all students that graduated in any given year in calculating graduation rates, regardless of how long it had taken a student to finish.

The new data shows that even states with high graduation rates overall aren’t doing as well at graduating some student groups. Connecticut has an 83 percent graduation rate, one of the highest in the northeast. But when it comes to low-income students, only 62 percent graduate. (Connecticut also has one of the widest test score gaps in the nation between low-income students and their more affluent peers.) Minnesota has one of the largest gaps in achievement between black and white students, with a graduation rate for white students 15 percentage points higher than black. And in South Dakota, where 83 percent of all students graduate, less than half of Asian, Pacific Islanders, and American Indians earn their diplomas.

“By using this new measure, states will be more honest in holding schools accountable and ensuring that students succeed,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. “These data will help states target support to ensure more students graduate on time.”

The lowest graduation rate was in Washington, D.C., where 59 percent of all students, and only 39 percent of students with disabilities, graduate high school on time. But D.C. does a better job of graduating black students than Minnesota and Oregon, and graduates a larger percentage of low-income students than Nevada and Alaska, all states with higher overall graduation rates.

Several states have relatively stable numbers across racial and income lines. Iowa, which claimed the highest graduation rate of 88 percent, had little variation in rates for different student groups, as did Texas and Arkansas.

At least 30 states are launching new systems to evaluate teachers using more rigorous criteria about what makes a good teacher, but so far there is little consensus on what the criteria should be.

Teacher evaluations have become highly controversial as states introduce increasingly different models.

Can the quality of a teacher be measured by looking at just a few key skills, such as setting academic goals and running an effective class discussion? Or should teachers be evaluated based on a broader range of abilities, including lesson-planning and content knowledge?

In Los Angeles, teachers will soon be evaluated on a list of 61 criteria during classroom observations conducted by school administrators. Louisiana, by contrast, requires principals to look at just five skills in the observation portion of the state’s new teacher evaluations. In most classrooms in Tennessee, principals use a checklist that includes 19 skills during observations that are part of a new, more intensive evaluation system launched last year. In each place, a teacher’s rating will be based on a combination of classroom observations and student achievement data.

Both the longer and shorter observation checklists have met with criticism. The Los Angeles Times reports that while teachers participating in the roll-out of a new evaluation system planned for the Los Angeles Unified School District are generally optimistic about it, many administrators are concerned about the time it takes to observe and rate teachers on 61 skills. In Louisiana’s case, Charlotte Danielson, the architect of a longer checklist on which Louisiana’s observation tool is based, warned that the state’s truncated version is simplistic and may lead to lawsuits.

The Los Angeles checklist is also based on Danielson’s framework, but the district added extra skills to some of the evaluation areas to reflect the local context and California standards for teachers. And although the framework being piloted in Los Angeles is lengthy, the district is only focusing on a handful of areas while piloting the program this year, including “classroom climate” and “teacher interaction with students.”

These two indicators appear in other observation rubrics across the country, but the importance they are given in different rating systems varies. Florida’s Miami-Dade school district has also made teacher-student relationships a priority. There, teachers are rated on eight performance standards including “learning environment,” which holds more weight in the evaluation score than the standards evaluating professionalism and communication. In Louisiana, assessments and procedures, or the extent to which the class “runs itself” through routines, are the priority, and separate indicators measuring a classroom’s climate and learning culture were dropped.

Despite the lack of agreement about the details, the evaluations are becoming increasingly important as more states are using new evaluations to determine who can stay in the classroom. Under Louisiana’s new system, teachers could lose their certification if they receive an “ineffective” rating for two years in a row. In Washington, D.C., 7 percent of the teaching force was fired after a controversial new evaluation system was launched two years ago. (The District of Columbia Public Schools originally included a total of 22 standards in its observation framework, but dropped the number to 18 after teachers complained that the number of requirements was overwhelming.)

When the Measures of Effective Teaching project, a study in six districts funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, observed nearly 3,000 teachers using five different observation systems, researchers found that it didn’t really matter which practices were emphasized on an evaluation. Teachers who more effectively demonstrated the types of practices emphasized in any given system had greater student achievement gains than other teachers. (Disclosure: the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is among the many funders of The Hechinger Report.)

But educators and researchers say the observation process is not meant just to identify which teachers are high-performing. It’s also supposed to help low-performing teachers improve their practice. “The goal of supervision and evaluation should be to develop expert teachers who are self-correcting,” said Michael Toth, CEO of the Learning Sciences Marzano Center for Teacher and Leadership Evaluation, an organization that develops teacher evaluation tools, in a press release. Toth cited results of a study that found teachers assessed with more detailed observation tools are more likely to change their classroom practices. “The more specific the model is … the better the model will be in driving teacher development,” Toth said.

Some teachers in Los Angeles told the Los Angeles Times that their new evaluation system does just that by focusing on specific areas and encouraging collaboration and reflection. Last year, 450 teachers and 320 administrators tested the system. By the end of this school year, every principal and one volunteer teacher at each school in the district will be trained, with a district-wide roll-out date still to be determined.

Republicans in Mississippi intend to fight for charter schools during the 2013 legislative session, renewing a contentious battle from last year’s session.

Past charter school legislation failed in Mississippi after heated legislature debates over funding and teacher quality provisions. (Photo by Jackie Mader)

At a Mississippi Economic Council gathering in late October, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves vowed to support school choice legislation that would create more avenues for charter schools to open in the state, the Memphis Commercial Appeal reported.

Proponents say there may be a better chance of passing legislation in 2013 because the state’s failing school system has received increased attention from the media, and lawmakers came close to passing a law during last year’s legislative session. Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant has touted charter schools in neighboring Arkansas and Louisiana as models of success, and said charter schools are “desperately needed,” especially in failing districts.

The renewed push for charter schools, which are publicly funded and privately run, comes after voters in Georgia passed an initiative on Tuesday that will allow charter schools to open. Ballots are still being counted on a similar initiative in Washington State, which would allow 40 charter schools to open over the next five years. Charter schools are currently allowed in 41 states and the District of Columbia.

A 2010 state law in Mississippi makes it possible for failing schools to be converted to charter schools beginning in the 2012-13 school year if more than 50 percent of parents vote in favor of the conversion. Currently, 35 failing schools are eligible to be converted, but none have begun the process to transform into charters yet.

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The Hechinger Report is taking a long look at what’s behind the woeful performance of Mississippi’s schoolchildren, as well as possible solutions to help them catch up.

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But even supporters of charter schools say the current law wouldn’t change schools for the better, because it fails to give parents much power. A parent board can govern each converted school, but the local school board still has ultimate control and the State Department of Education has veto power over most decisions made. The parent board can hire a charter management organization, but that organization cannot control hiring of teachers or choose curriculum.

“It’s a parent trigger [law] that triggers nothing,” said Rachel Canter, the executive director of the non-profit advocacy group Mississippi First.

Canter says that new legislation would most likely preserve parent-triggered conversion, but would also allow new charter schools to be created from the ground up. She says a new proposal would let nonprofit organizations run charters and give them autonomy over decision-making.

Last April, a similar proposal failed by one vote after five Republicans in the House Education Committee broke rank and voted against the bill. And while Mississippi’s state Senate is majority Republican, there was resistance from Republican lawmakers who are concerned that charters will siphon money away from successful public schools in their counties. Canter says that the law also may have failed in April because many people didn’t know what a charter school was.

“I think people in the legislature have made a commitment to back up, and give people that time and space to talk about [charter schools] and think,” she said.

Under current Mississippi law, only failing schools can be converted to charter schools if a majority of parents approve. (Photo by Jackie Mader)

But opponents of charters in Mississippi are concerned that charter schools could become segregated if they end up catering to students who would otherwise be in private schools. Democratic leaders have criticized House Speaker Philip Gunn, who recently announced plans to remove a Democrat from the Education Committee and fill the position with a Republican, who is a known charter school supporter. Brandon Jones, a former House member, called the move “unprecedented,” and accused Gunn of changing the rules to ensure the legislation will be passed. Opponents have also protested parts of past charter school legislation that would have exempted teachers from holding state certifications.

“Lawyers all have to get licensed and certified and so do doctors,” said Kevin Gilbert, president of the Mississippi Association of Educators to the Jackson Free Press. “There’s not a hospital around here or a law firm that’s going to hire 50 percent of lawyers who don’t have their degree.”

The renewed push for charters adds to an increasing list of potential education initiatives up for discussion when the state’s legislative session convenes in January.

The state consistently posts some of the lowest test scores in the country, and Reeves called for higher academic standards at the Mississippi Economic Council meeting. Legislators will also consider requests to fund early childhood education for the first time in the state. Mississippi is the only state in the South that does not provide state-funded preschool, which many say could help reduce the achievement gap.

“We all know that public education in Mississippi is terrible,” Canter said, adding that although policy hasn’t changed yet, just seeing legislators focus on education has been encouraging. “We all know we have to do something.”

Too many teachers across the country are missing work too often, and their absences are taking significant academic and financial tolls on schools, according to a new report by the Center for American Progress.

The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit analyzed teacher attendance rates at more than 56,000 schools across the country in “Teacher Absence as a Leading Indicator of Student Achievement.” The report found that nearly 40 percent of teachers nationally missed more than 10 days of school during the 2009-10 school year, costing districts at least $4 billion in substitute-teacher and administrative fees.

The report’s author, Raegen Miller, writes that student achievement suffers when a teacher is frequently absent. “Every 10 absences lowers average mathematics achievement equivalent to the difference between having a novice teacher and one with a bit more experience,” Miller writes, referencing a 2008 study. “It’s plausible that achievement gaps can be attributed, in part, to a teacher attendance gap.”

Some states and individual districts have alarmingly high rates of absenteeism. In Arkansas, Hawaii and Rhode Island, nearly half of all teachers missed 10 or more days of school, compared with only 20 percent of teachers in Utah.

In New Jersey’s Camden City Public Schools, a district that has struggled with poverty and poor test scores, up to 40 percent of teachers are absent on any given school day, a figure that has forced the district to hire a private substitute-teacher agency to help ensure there’s an adult in each classroom.

Nationally, teachers are more likely to be absent if they’re female, teach in middle schools, or teach in public schools rather than charters. Schools with high proportions of African-American or Latino students, as well as those with more low-income students, also reported higher rates of teacher absences.

Differences in state policies also lead to disparities. Some states allow teachers as many as 15 paid sick days a year, for instance, while others allow just seven. The report found that teacher absences are often driven by district- or school-level factors, too. Teachers tend to be absent less when they’re required to notify their principals of an absence by telephone, and a separate study found that schools with stressful or negative staff cultures had higher absence rates.

The report recommends giving teachers at least seven paid sick days per year, but reducing the number of excused absences in districts that lean toward a “more permissive” policy. It also recommends that school districts use incentives to discourage “frivolous” use of paid leave, and adopt electronic systems to manage absences in more cost-effective ways.

Miami-Dade County’s public school system–which U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said is moving in the “absolute right direction,’’–won the 2012 Broad Prize for Urban Education on Tuesday during a ceremony at the Museum of Modern Art .

Miami-Dade district science teacher Eugenio Machado instructs Gabriel Marino, Stella Leone and Melanie Larson. (Photo by Al Diaz/Miami Herald)

The win followed five nominations for The Broad prize, which recognizes gains in student achievement in large urban districts. Duncan highlighted the district’s success in outperforming all other comparable Florida districts in 2011 reading, math, and science tests at all school levels. He also commended its use of student data, which he said is driving improvement in the nation’s fourth largest school district.

The district, led by Superintendent Alberto Carvalho, serves nearly 350,000 students, 90 percent of whom are black or Hispanic and 70 percent low-income. The Broad Prize winner receives $550,000 in college scholarship money for high school seniors.

While Miami-Dade has notable accomplishments—the district’s graduation rate, for instance, increased 5.6 percent in one year, to nearly 78 percent in 2011—the district has also had some struggles. In 2011, in a move contested by the United Teachers of Dade, Miami-Dade was the first district in the state to award merit pay to its teachers, a statewide requirement for all Florida districts by 2014.

The state of Florida has also mandated a complicated teacher evaluation system in which 50 percent of evaluations are based on a complex formula involving student test scores. The other 50 percent is left up to districts. In Miami-Dade, that half is currently based on one formal observation by an administrator, a method that has been criticized throughout the U.S.

In early 2012, a report by the National Council on Teacher Quality, a research group based in Washington D.C., said that the district was not doing enough to get rid of underperforming teachers. The group suggested that the district provide more feedback to teachers, consider college and licensing test scores when hiring teachers, and give principals more authority in hiring.

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Eli Broad, co-founder of The Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, reminded the audience at the award ceremony that the prize is about progress, not victory. (Disclaimer: the Broad Foundation is among the many supporters of The Hechinger Report.)

“We didn’t fall behind overnight and we are not going to catch up overnight either,” Broad said. “Even the districts here today…acknowledge that they have a long road ahead of them.”

Last year, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District in North Carolina won after reducing the achievement gap in high-school reading between African-American and white students by 11 percentage points between 2007 and 2010. The district had closed nearly a dozen schools, mostly in majority black neighborhoods and sent layoff notices to more than 700 teachers.

In the year since winning the prize, Charlotte-Mecklenburg graduation rates have increased nearly two percent to 75 percent, but test scores have remained low at some of the poorest performing schools.

The three runners-up of this year’s Broad Prize will each receive $150,000 in scholarship money. Two of these districts, the Corona-Norco Unified School district in California and The School District of Palm Beach County, Fla., were first-time finalists. The Houston Independent School District won the inaugural year of the award in 2002.

More inexperienced teachers are in today’s classrooms than ever before and they are more open than their veteran colleagues to performance-driven options for how they’re evaluated and paid, according to the results of a new survey conducted by the Boston-based nonprofit Teach Plus.

For the first time in decades, more than 50 percent of the nation’s teaching force is comprised of teachers who have been in the classroom under 10 years, Teach Plus found in “Great Expectations: Teachers’ Views on Elevating the Teaching Profession,” which looks at the changing demographics of U.S. teachers.

From “Seven Trends: The Transformation of the Teaching Force,” by Richard Ingersoll and Lisa Merrill (May 2012)

The national survey asked 1,015 new and veteran teachers their views on some of the most contentious issues in U.S. public education, like teacher evaluations and class size, to see if attitudes are shifting with an influx of newer teachers.

Despite differences in experience, teachers are generally united when it comes to working conditions. The majority of both newbies and veterans agree that class sizes should not be increased, even if doing so would provide districts with more funding to raising salaries. The two groups are also in agreement about keeping the school day shorter and said that increasing pay is key to elevating public respect for the profession.

On the topic of teacher evaluations, though—one of the most highly debated issues in education reform—the two demographics have mostly differing views. They agree that current teacher evaluations are ineffective at improving instruction, but 71 percent of less experienced teachers say their evaluation should be tied to student test score growth, compared to only 41 percent of veteran teachers.

Those who began teaching in the last decade are also more supportive of changing compensation and tenure systems, and more likely to think the use of student data is important to teach more effectively.

Celine Coggins, founder and CEO of Teach Plus, said a new generation of teachers has been exposed to the magnitude of the achievement gap, which may influence their attitudes and their belief in the importance of data.

“Closing gaps among racial groups and across income levels motivates the commitment to teaching for so many,” Coggins said.

In 1987, the majority of teachers had 15 years of experience, according to a study by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania. Now, with about half of new teachers leaving urban classrooms within three years, teachers with just one year of experience are the most common in U.S. classrooms. And each year, 200,000 new teachers enter the profession, 65 percent of whom are recent college graduates.

Mark Teoh, director of research and knowledge at Teach Plus, said that these new teachers were most likely students during or after the introduction of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2002, and said their attitudes show they are more accustomed to testing and accountability than their more experienced colleagues.

At a time when states are introducing the Common Core standards and new evaluation methods, Teoh says these shifting teacher attitudes could influence education reform, as policymakers hear “what kind of profession these teachers want to see, and what kind of workforce they want to be a part of.”

The report also highlights problems that come with a younger, less experienced teaching force. Teach Plus recommends including teacher opinion in policymaking and encouraging newer teachers to take on leadership roles.

“There’s definitely room and a hunger for these teachers to be part in the policy process itself,” Teoh said. “They’re the ones who are there all the time, and they can provide the feedback, guidance and perspective that [are] needed.”

Advocates of a privately funded early education program in Mississippi are asking the state for five million dollars to expand, in a move they hope will improve school readiness for children who too often start behind – and stay behind.

From left, Ms. Rhonda Winston, Davion Sims (in her lap), MeKenzi Stephens, Eziyah Robinson, Kimiyah Nuttall, Kaitlyn White and Eben Banks Jr. at Little Angels Day Care, which is part of the Building Blocks program. (Photo by Kim Palmer)

The request to expand Mississippi Building Blocks follows increasing media coverage of early education in Mississippi, one of 11 states in the nation, and the only state in the south, that does not fund pre-K. The program works to improve school readiness for children in the state with the highest child poverty rate, and some of the lowest test scores in the nation.

Claiborne Barksdale, CEO of the Barksdale Reading Institute, which helps fund Building Blocks, said during a news conference earlier this week that money will run out before the fifth year if the state does not contribute. Former president and CEO of Netscape Communications, Jim Barksdale, told WLBT that this program is essential for Mississippi’s future. “These children are better prepared for kindergarten which means they’re better prepared to go on to school life ahead of them,” Barksdale said. “They’re better prepared to be contributing citizens of this state.”

Mississippi has more than 1700 child care centers in the state, but quality varies greatly. There are no consistent education standards, and early childhood teachers are not required to have more than a high school diploma or GED.

MISSISSIPPI LEARNING
The Hechinger Report is taking a long look at what’s behind the woeful performance of Mississippi’s schoolchildren, as well as possible solutions to help them catch up.

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Building Blocks has helped over 500 early childhood programs teach literacy and school readiness skills.

The program provides equipment, a research-based curriculum, and teacher training in 31 Mississippi counties. A University of Missouri study found the program had a positive impact on children’s skills and social emotional development, and children in the program, when compared to a control group, had double the scores on school-readiness skills assessments. The program has also proved to be affordable— since its inception four years ago, it has been sustained entirely by private funding.

Mississippi’s Department of Education has already requested an unprecedented $2.5 million in the 2014 budget request for an early education pilot program, but Gov. Phil Bryant has not commented on whether Building Blocks will receive any of those funds.

The Hechinger Report, via partnerships in Time and NBC News, has highlighted problems resulting from the lack of high quality early childhood education in the state.

With American schools focused on raising reading and math scores to meet accountability requirements, writing often takes a backseat. The class of 2012 posted the lowest average writing score on the SAT this year since writing became part of the exam in 2006.

But with 45 states adopting Common Core standards that include writing and specifically grammar, some educators are examining new ways to bring grammar back into the classroom.

Roberta Stathis

“I think increasingly there’s an understanding that while we don’t ever want to go back to the drill and kill approach, from research and educators, we know that [explicit grammar instruction] is a critical component in education,” said Roberta Stathis, executive director of The Teacher Writing Center, which runs the Grammar Gallery, an online resource for writing and reading instruction.

Day three of NBC’s Education Nation summit featured the winner of the $75,000 Citi Innovation Challenge, a website called NoRedInk! that helps students improve grammar and writing skills. The website incorporates popular culture into student lessons and allows teachers to track progress on individual writing concepts, with lessons aligned to the Common Core standards.

Currently, emphasis on grammar in curriculum varies from state to state. The Teacher Writing Center has seen an increase in districts using its online writing program, with about 50 currently participating. But Patrice Gotsch, associate director at the Center, says there are some teachers and administrators who don’t embrace explicit grammar instruction.

While grammar was one of the most-emphasized subjects during the 1950s, schools have shifted away from it since then, according to one study. “There’s plenty of research that traditional grammar instruction and diagramming sentences does not work,” said Sandra Wilde, a professor at Hunter College in New York City.

When the Common Core standards are rolled out in 45 states in 2014, teachers will be expected to explicitly teach concepts like participles and infinitives, and students will be expected to explain usage of such terms.

Wilde says she expects that the revival of grammar will prompt companies to develop new products and textbooks. She added that developers should ensure that online sites aren’t replicating the old grammar workbooks in a high-tech package. “To be good,” she said, “the developers would be well-served by really working with some literacy people who are up to date in the field and have some innovative ways of thinking about it.”

Video games are increasingly popular learning tools in classrooms, but not all teachers are sold on the benefits.

Day two of NBC’s Education Nation summit highlighted the potential for video games to tailor material to a student’s individual level and allow teachers to track student progress. But while games can provide valuable information about how students learn, there is still little evidence that video games positively impact student achievement. And many teachers are skeptical about incorporating games in the classroom, even if it means students would be more invested in lessons.

During a Monday panel on gaming in the classroom, educators brought up some of their main concerns with the emerging technology. Todd Beard, a K-12 technology teacher in Flint, Mich., said his students have trouble transferring skills they learn playing educational games in class to paper-based tests. While his students may appear to master skills during a video game, they forget it when they’re taking an assessment later. Beard tells his students, “It’s the same thing, you just did that,’” he said. He believes his students aren’t as invested in tests because they aren’t as fun as the games. “I feel like they’re learning [skills], but I have to prove that on an assessment,” Beard added.

Children ages 8 to 18 spend an average of 7.5 hours a day using entertainment media, so some teachers say parents don’t want their kids spending more time playing video games at school. And funding can be an issue for some schools. “We pay for the [gaming] sites,” said Lyssa Sahadevan, a first-grade teacher in Marietta, Ga., speaking to The Hechinger Report after the panel. “So that’s a challenge.”

While Sahadevan says she has seen her first-graders transfer their skills from games to tests, she has struggled to find games that assess students as they play, so kids may spend time on a level that is too high or too low for them. Several of Sahadevan’s colleagues have embraced technology and encourage students to bring their own devices to school to engage in online learning. But in large classes with multiple students using devices, Sahadevan says it can be hard to monitor everyone.

Some educators worry that teachers haven’t been sufficiently trained to integrate video games into schools. “I’d love you to talk about the kinds of professional development that teachers are going to need,” said Anne Bryant, executive director of the National School Boards Association during the panel. “Where is it going to happen and how is it going to happen?” Her comment echoed the findings of a recent LEAD Commission poll, which reported that many teachers aren’t prepared to use technology effectively.

And while video games may be the future of digital learning, teacher Sahadevan says there are still basic issues that need to be fixed in education before more teachers will utilize technology. “We can’t get books in classrooms,” Sahadevan said. “Unless they’re going to give all these programs for free, its like dangling candy in front of a kid. We want it, but we can’t get to it, and that’s a problem.”

NBC’s third annual Education Nation summit kicked off Sunday with a focus on solutions: ideas with a track record of success and potential for replication. But for teachers attending the event, a central concern continues to be new evaluations, which helped set off a teacher strike in Chicago this September.

Outside NBC’s Education Nation event

Thirty-two states have made changes to teacher evaluation policies in recent years, according to a 2011 report by the National Council on Teacher Quality, and 23 now require that data about student learning be included in teacher ratings.

In a poll during a teacher town hall hosted by Education Nation on Sunday, 72 percent of teachers in attendance said they believe less than a third of their rating should depend on student test scores. Many said their students face barriers that affect their scores, which can lead to unfair assessments of their teaching. They expressed frustration about a lack of resources, the prevalence of poverty among their students, and a belief that the public doesn’t really understand what they’re up against every day.

Tension rose quickly after a charter-school teacher said that while previously working at a district-run school, the union told her not to work past a certain time. “I didn’t care, I just stayed,” she said. District teachers in the forum responded that they too work long hours. AFT president Randi Weingarten wrote on Twitter that there are “no prohibitions” in contracts regarding hours spent at school.

NBC education correspondent Rehema Ellis said her main takeaway from covering the Chicago teachers’ strike was that “teachers suffer from a perception problem,” explaining that most people do not understand why teachers are upset about some issues, like lack of air conditioning in schools, because many of the issues are not framed correctly and may seem trivial to the public.

Despite the divisions over evaluations, however, teachers were united on other ideas about how to improve classroom teaching. “Teachers need to know kids first, content comes second,” said one teacher. “What our children most need is the belief in their ability to succeed,” added another. “They absolutely must have that message.”