Working Together to Foster Candidate Success on the edTPA
Journal of Inquiry & Action in Education
Working Together to Foster Candidate Success on the edTPA
Barbara A. Burns Canisius College 0 1
Julie J. Henry Canisius College 0 1
Jeffrey R. Lindauer 0 1
0 The Stanford Center for Assessment , Learning and Equity (SCALE), taking the stance
1 Canisius College
This action research study examined the effectiveness of one model for supporting candidates in their work in preparing and submitting their edTPA portfolios. Surveys of student teachers and their cooperating teachers were administered and analyzed to determine how the model impacted their experiences with the edTPA. This data can inform implementation efforts at other campuses. In an effort to professionalize teaching, attention is shifting to more rigorous standards in teacher education. One such move is focused on the educative Teacher Performance Assessment (edTPA), a summative assessment used to evaluate student teacher quality and preparation. Successful performance on the edTPA was set to be required for all teacher candidates seeking certification in New York State beginning spring 2014. At the end of April 2014, however, the New York State Board of Regents decided to delay the high-stakes implementation, changing the requirement so that candidates needed to attempt the edTPA, but could substitute an alternative assessment if they were not successful on the edTPA. Campuses were thus preparing for a Spring 2014 high-stakes implementation, although this turned into a dry run for the new high-stakes implementation date of Fall 2015. Once fully implemented, edTPA scores will also be used as a measure of program effectiveness, and poor passing rates will result in teacher education programs being designated as ineffective by the New York State Education Department. that individuals entering the teaching profession must be prepared to meet the academic needs of all students, developed the edTPA to measure teacher candidates' readiness to teach. The edTPA is the first nationally available, educator-designed performance assessment for teachers entering
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the profession
(SCALE, 2013)
. SCALE is responsible for all design and development of edTPA;
they have partnered with AACTE to support the development and implementation of edTPA and
with Pearson as their operational partner to provide the infrastructure for submitting, scoring and
reporting edTPA results. The edTPA is designed to improve assessment of teacher candidates
and ultimately reform and distinguish teaching as a profession. It is expected that candidates who
score well on edTPA will be more likely to be effective teachers. The edTPA also allows teacher
preparation programs the opportunity to self-assess. Teacher education leaders such as Linda
Darling-Hammond are optimistic about the development of a standardized performance
assessment which includes authentic tasks to use for teacher candidate performance and teacher
preparation program review, noting that “By evaluating teaching authentically, they
(performance assessments) represent the complexity of teaching and offer standards that can
define an expert profession”
(Darling-Hammond & Hyler, 2013, p. 13)
.
The edTPA has been developed in twenty-seven different fields based on licensure areas.
This comprehensive assessment includes artifacts demonstrating candidates’ abilities to plan,
instruct and assess particular learning segments of 3-5 lessons during student teaching. The three
tasks (planning, instructing, and assessing) allow candidate work to be scored using a series of
15 rubrics, five rubrics per task for most versions. The World Language edTPA is unique in that
it only has 13 rubrics due to the distinctness of the language demands, and the Elementary
Education edTPA includes an additional Task 4, Assessing Students’ Mathematics Learning,
which is assessed using three additional rubrics for a total of 18. The rubrics are based on a 5
point score, 1 – 5, which rates candidates’ work along a continuum from not ready to teach,
depicted by a teacher focused, whole class, fragmented or indiscriminate presentation of work,
scored as a 1, to a highly accomplished beginner teacher with evidence of student focused,
individual or flexible groups, integrated, intentional and well executed presentation of work
scored as a 5. Some states use the edTPA as part of program completion without a state cut
score. Other states are setting minimum scores for certification. In these states, the scores from
the rubrics are tallied and a final score is compared to a cut score established by the state to
determine if candidates pass or fail the edTPA.
Candidate preparation for edTPA is an integral part of teacher education programs
because of the authenticity of the tasks candidates complete. Not only an assessment, edTPA is
an inquiry process where candidates’ practice is examined both locally and nationally. Candidate
performance on edTPA will be used in accreditation reports for institutions of higher (...truncated)