School Administrators as Instructional Coaches: Teachers' Trust and Perceptions of Administrators' Capacity

Abstract

As the Texas Education Agency (TEA) rolls out the state-wide implementation of the new teacher evaluation system, thousands of Texas school administrators have completed the required training and have become certified appraisers under the new Texas Teacher Evaluation and Support System (T-TESS). During the state training, participants are challenged to serve as change agents in leading the shift in thinking about teacher evaluations to embrace a teacher growth model with an instructional supervision platform. Studies have indeed found that school principals who are involved in instructional supervision have a positive impact on test scores, including a constant improvement in scores at schools with an increasingly high percentage of economically disadvantaged students (Glanz, Shulman & Sullivan, 2007). T-TESS provides educators a tool that has the potential to significantly impact the quality of instruction in Texas classrooms, and ultimately student achievement.