What Do Test Scores Miss? The Importance of Teacher Effects on Non–Test Score Outcomes

By C. Jackson, Michael F. Lovenheim, James Pustejovsky, Jonah E. Rockoff, Alexey Makarin. Journal of Political Economy, 2018

458 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Teachers affect a variety of student outcomes through their influence on both cognitive and noncognitive skill. I proxy for students’ noncognitive skill using non–test score behaviors. These behaviors include absences, suspensions, course grades, and grade repetition in ninth grade. Teacher effects on test scores and those on behaviors are weakly correlated. Teacher effects on behaviors predict larger impacts on high school completion and other longer-run outcomes than their effects on test scores. Relative to using only test score measures, using effects on both test score and noncognitive measures more than doubles the variance of predictable teacher impacts on longer-run outcomes.

Subfields: Education

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a30b4a708a97f560ba76f40523ac8fb034e9ba5a

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Citations in the corpus

The Long-Run Impacts of Same-Race Teachers (2017, unknown): “Good teachers can improve students’ test scores, non-cognitive skills, and long-run outcomes such as earnings and college going (Chetty et al., 2014; Jackson, 2018).6 However, identifying effective teachers a priori is difficult and the channels through which teachers affect long-run outcomes…”
High School GPAs and ACT Scores as Predictors of College Completion: Examining Assumptions About Consistency Across High Schools (2020, background): “The teachers and schools that improve test scores are not always the same as those that improve students’ grades (Jackson, 2016), and programs that have positive effects on test scores do not always have positive effects on grades (Nomi & Allensworth, 2009).”
The Long-Term Effects of Universal Preschool in Boston (2021, unknown): “A related literature shows effects of teachers and schools on nontest outcomes such as suspensions, truancy, absenteeism, course grades, and crime (Deming 2011; Jackson 2018; Petek and Pope 2021).”
Why High School Grades Are Better Predictors of On-Time College Graduation Than Are Admissions Test Scores: The Roles of Self-Regulation and Cognitive Ability (2019, background): “…including standardized achievement test scores (Duckworth, Weir, Tsukayama, & Kwok, 2012); on-time grade promotion and high school graduation (Jackson, 2018); enrollment, performance, and persistence in college (Pattison, Grodsky, & Muller, 2013; Robbins et al., 2004; Westrick, Le, Robbins,…”
Do School Spending Cuts Matter? Evidence from the Great Recession (2018, unknown): “…(with expected graduation in 2008), Ec is 0, for those born in 1985 (with expected graduation in 2003), Ec is -5, and for those born in 15Indeed, Jackson (2018) finds that teacher impacts on test scores are much weaker predictors of their impacts on high school completion than teacher’s impacts…”
The Hidden Costs of Teacher Turnover (2020, background): “Although value-added measures do predict student long term success (Chetty, Friedman, & Rockoff, 2014), they still miss teacher contributions to the many non-test score outcomes that also contribute to long term success (Jackson, 2018).”
Gender Stereotypes in the Classroom and Effects on Achievement (2017, background): “…the effect on objective tests may also point to the fact that grades tend to reflect noncognitive skills and good behavior in addition to pure exam performance, especially in elementary school (Brookhart, 1993; McMillan, Myran, & Workman, 2002; Borghans, Goldsteyn, & Heckman, 2016; Jackson, 2016).”
Does school spending matter? The new literature on an old question. (2018, unknown): “One such paper is Jackson et al. (2018). In this paper, the authors rely on the fact that during the Great Recession state tax receipts (state income taxes and sales taxes) fell very suddenly relative to that for local taxes or federal taxes.”
A Teacher Like Me: A Review of the Effect of Student–Teacher Racial/Ethnic Matching on Teacher Perceptions of Students and Student Academic and Behavioral Outcomes (2019, background): “The potential for student–teacher racial/ethnic matching to improve students’ opportunities to learn and reduce achievement disparities is rooted in the critical role that teachers play in their students’ cognitive and behavioral development (Blazer & Kraft, 2017; Borghans, Duckworth, Heckman, & ter”
The Effect of Teacher Coaching on Instruction and Achievement: A Meta-Analysis of the Causal Evidence (2018, unknown): “These findings are particularly troubling given the lasting impact teachers have on individual students’ long-term outcomes and on the economy as a whole (Chetty, Friedman, & Rockoff, 2014; Hanushek, 2011; Jackson, 2016).”