How Marzano Research Can Help Your District Comply and Improve

If you’re a school district leader in Alaska, you may be familiar with the state’s legal requirement to periodically review your educator evaluation system. This mandate is both a challenge and an opportunity for districts to make sure their evaluation systems are aligned with best practices that meet the evolving needs of educators and students.

…a school board shall consider information from students, parents, community members, classroom teachers, affected collective bargaining units, and administrators in the design and periodic review of the district’s certificated employee evaluation system.
– Alaska Statute § 14.20.149

While the Alaska Department of Education does provide resources for conducting evaluation system reviews and updates, some districts want more support for completing this important task. Fortunately, the team at Marzano Research has extensive experience guiding districts through review processes and system improvements.

A full evaluation system redesign can be a massive undertaking that isn’t always necessary. To determine what is best for a partner, we help them to answer the question, “What is going well that we want to keep?” There are typically three approaches our partners choose from when considering system updates, depending on the condition or age of their evaluation system: 1) a simple review process to verify there are no large gaps or weak points, 2) identifying and making targeted revisions, or 3) when needed, a full redesign. Our recent partnership with Lower Kusksokwim School District (LKSD) to improve three of their evaluation systems involved all of these approaches.

As Alaska’s largest rural district, LKSD oversees 27 schools, employs around 350 teachers, and serves approximately 4,000 students, many of whom are from the Yup’ik Native community. LKSD staff embrace cultural diversity and work closely with the local communities to deepen connections between the schools and the families they serve. Ensuring these community and district values were represented and reflected in their evaluation systems was the top priority as they started their system review process.

“We decided to work with Marzano Research because it was a natural extension of the work we had been doing with REL Northwest on improving staff working conditions and building leadership capacity,” said Erin Schalk-Haviland, the assistant superintendent of human resources and student services at LKSD. “So, we reached out to ask them to help us with the updating process. We knew it was a bigger project than we had the capacity for internally—that we needed help and we knew that Marzano Research does really good work that is research-based, which is very important to us.”

In this blog, you’ll read about our partnership with LKSD that demonstrates how Marzano Research can help your district comply with state requirements and improve your evaluation practices.

Structures and Processes for Collaborative Development

In our work with LKSD, we engaged with several groups of stakeholders and users to ensure the process was a truly collaborative effort.

• District Core Leadership Team: We worked closely with a small team of district leaders who provided guidance, identified committee members, and approved final deliverables.
• Evaluation System Committees: We value the contextual knowledge and experience of leaders and staff who will become the users of the new evaluation systems. So, we worked with LKSD to create committees of 10-15 members (including evaluators and those who would be evaluated), representing a cross section of staff across schools.
• Targeted Users: For each evaluation system, we worked with a focused group of users, including some who were familiar with the processes/tools and some who were new to them. This allowed us to gather comprehensive feedback to refine the systems.

For an inclusive, consensus- driven process, our skilled facilitation team made sure each participant had a voice, and we allotted time for thorough exploration of key principles, options and decisions.

An Example from Lower Kusksokwim School District

Let’s take a closer look at how this approach played out in our work with LKSD. Marzano Research lead the development of three educator evaluation systems for the district: one for administrators, one for non-certified staff, and another for teachers.

We began with a landscape scan, taking a deep dive into the current LKSD system and researching similar systems across Alaska and nationally.

Working closely with the LKSD committee, we then facilitated the development of domains, standards, and evaluation processes. This involved activities like reviewing draft standards, defining benchmarks and indicators, and designing rubrics.

A standard review was sufficient for the administrator evaluation system since it needed the fewest updates. The committee members determined the teacher evaluation system needed targeted revisions, specifically to the domains, standards, and evaluation rubric. The largest system shift was focused on the non-certified staff evaluation system, which we redesigned.

Once the core components of our revision process were in place, we provided direct assistance to a committee of evaluators and administrators to review the new tools and processes for the teacher and non-certified staff evaluation systems.

Then we collaborated with sample users comprised of both experienced users and newcomers to test the evaluation processes and tools. This strategy gave us well-rounded insights to refine and enhance the systems.

Finally, we planned and delivered professional development to everyone who would be using the new systems, with a focus on training evaluators to help ensure understanding and consistent use of the system.

Throughout all stages, we maintained a collaborative approach that gave voice to a variety of stakeholders and sought consensus on key decisions. This made sure the resulting systems were aligned with district values, supported by the users, and able to drive meaningful improvement in educator practice and student outcomes.

Marzano Research’s Approach to Designing Effective Evaluation Systems

At the core of Marzano Research’s approach is the belief that evaluation systems should be developed as a collaborative process that aligns organizational values with best practices in pursuit of districtwide goals. We call this “engineered simplicity”—using sophisticated tools and methods to deliver practical solutions to real-world challenges.

Effective evaluation systems need to be user-friendly and establish clear pathways to success. Marzano Research’s deep evaluation system toolbox allows us to design customized planning processes that meet each district’s unique needs.

Fundamentally, we see this process as an opportunity to build district capacity, improve community engagement, and promote equity.

Evaluation as a Capacity-Building Activity

When districts partner with us, they receive customized support that enhances their ability to use evaluation systems to enact their values and achieve districtwide goals. We help leaders and educators separate the technical aspects of evaluation from the adaptive, creating realistic roadmaps for growth and improvement.

Evaluation as an Ecological Process

An effective evaluation process should reflect the shared goals and aspirations of the communities the district is embedded in. We assist districts in using evaluation systems to reinforce community values and strengthen the role schools play in sustaining local culture, while encouraging reciprocal engagement of the community in the schools.

Evaluation as an Act of Equity

Evaluation systems should provide a blueprint for putting a district’s equity values into practice. Marzano Research helps districts move beyond superficial declarations of equity, rethink resource allocation, and promote practices that produce more equitable outcomes for all students, especially those from historically underserved or marginalized communities.

The Ongoing Benefits for LKSD

By partnering with Marzano Research, LKSD now has three user-friendly evaluation systems that are grounded in best practices, are research-backed, and reflect the district’s unique context and values. The collaborative development process built district capacity, strengthened community engagement, and promoted equity of voice.

The administrator evaluation system, for instance, provides a clear framework for leadership development and holds evaluators accountable for providing meaningful feedback and support to their staff. The non-certified staff system recognizes the diverse contributions of support personnel and establishes equitable expectations. And the teacher evaluation system helps reinforce evidence-based instructional practices that improve student learning.

Schalk-Haviland said the overall process struck a good balance of collaboration without excessive, time-consuming work on their end, describing it as “thorough but not overwhelming.”

“Meetings are regular and informative but there are not too many check-ins that overwhelm us … I would also say that the people are great at Marzano Research—they are really friendly and have been extremely interested in LKSD as an organization. We have worked with Mike [Siebersma] off and on for over 10 years. The consistency of people in Marzano Research is really nice.”

How Marzano Research Can Help Your District

If your district is due for a review of your evaluation systems, reach out! Whether you need to develop new evaluation systems from scratch or refine your existing ones, Marzano Research can help. Our team of experienced facilitators and evaluation experts are ready to guide you through a customized process to ensure your systems are serving the unique needs of your district while meeting Alaska’s mandate.

To learn more about how Marzano Research can support your district’s evaluation system review and development, contact Mike Siebersma at mike.siebersma@marzanoresearch.com. We’re eager to discuss how our approach can help you comply with the state’s requirements and continuously improve your systems.

Sources

Alaska Statutes Title 14, Education, Libraries, and Museums § 14.20.149. et seq. (2023).

Educator Evaluation & Support. (n.d.). Alaska Department of Education. Retrieved April 15, 2024, from https://education.alaska.gov/akaccountability/educator/resources_sd