Perlstein starts off well by criticizing the inane trope President Obama repeated about "teacher effectiveness" in a recent speech.
In his education speech to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in March, President Obama said, “From the moment students enter a school, the most important factor in their success is not the color of their skin or the income of their parents. It’s the person standing at the front of the classroom.”
To put it bluntly: “He’s wrong.”
Indeed. First of all, the research on this issue isn't really research in the conventional sense that there are properly conducted controlled studies on point. There aren't. The "research" is merely correlational studies which does not rise to the level of real scientific research. At best, these studies might suggest profitable future avenues to pursue for conducting real scientific research.
Furthermore, these correlational studies are on teacher effectiveness, not "the person standing at the front of the classroom." There are a lot of variables tied up in the term "teacher effectiveness": the teacher, the pedagogy, the curriculum, the classroom environment, and the like. Only some of these variables are under the control of the person standing in front of the classroom, that is, the teacher. Moreover, the correlational studies are incapable of teasing out which variable(s) is responsible for correlation with student outcomes, in any event.
Nonetheless, this trope gets trotted out all the time in the dopier quarters of the edusphere. And, Perslstein is right to jump on it.
Perlstein, however, steps in it when she tries to state what the research actually shows:
Of the various factors inside school, teacher quality has had more effect on student scores than any other that has been measured. (emphasis in original)
To put it bluntly: “She’s wrong.”
First, to the extent that the studies are correlational in nature, they are incapable of showing that a variable, in this case teacher effectiveness, had "more of an effect" on anything, including student scores. The studies only show that "teacher effectiveness" (however the study attempted to define the variable) is correlated with student scores by some small amount. Correlation is not causation.
Second, "teacher effectiveness" is not the most effective factor inside school. See here and here. I don't know how this particular trope got started, but it is amazing how often it gets uncritically trotted out by education reporters and bloggers. Look at Perlstein's conclusion:
But for now, just remember: When you read that teachers are the most important school factor, you can’t drop the “school” and pass it on.
Regardless of whether you drop the "school" caveat or not, you should not be passing it on-- because it's not accurate.
Any educated reporter commenting on education should know this.
Welcome to the edusphere, Linda.