Houston, We Have a Lawsuit”

A Cautionary Tale for the Implementation of Value-Added Models for High-Stakes Employment Decisions

Bibliographic Data

ID9732606
AuthorsMark A Paige (University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, MA, corresponding author), Audrey Amrein-Beardsley (0000-0001-6924-3025, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ)
Year2020
Volume49
Issue5
Pages350-359
Publication date2020-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEducational Researcher (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0013-189X • E-ISSN: 1935-102X
PublisherAmerican Educational Research Association (AERA) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.3102/0013189x20923046
OpenAlexW3031135337
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited34

Until recently, legal challenges to the use of value-added models (VAMs) in evaluation and teacher employment decisions in federal court had been unsuccessful. However, in May 2017 a federal court in Texas ruled that plaintiff-teachers established a viable federal constitutional claim to challenge the use of VAMs as a means for their termination in Houston Federation of Teachers v. Houston Independent School District . Houston represents a significant departure from prior federal court rulings that upheld the constitutionality of VAMs to terminate teachers on the basis of poor performance. The Houston court found that the districts’ refusals to release the underlying data of VAM ratings used to terminate those teachers violated the teachers’ procedural due process rights. By denying access to the code, teachers could not protect against the government’s making a mistaken deprivation of their property right to continued right to employment. The authors discuss Houston and its potential impact, limitations, and significance

Constitutionality · Federal court · Government (linguistics · Lawsuit · Plaintiff · Political science · Sociology · Substantive due process · Supreme court · Value (mathematics · Educational Assessment and Improvement · Law · Legal Issues in Education · School Choice and Performance