Teachscape and LoTi Connection Announce Partnership to Provide Principal Evaluation System to School Districts Nationwide

CARLSBAD, CA, February 06, 2013 (Press-News.org) Teachscape, the leader in delivering Web-based professional learning content, innovative technologies, and expert services to improve teaching practice, and LoTi Connection, a longstanding leader in educator assessment, evaluation, and professional development services, have partnered to offer the New Jersey DOE-approved LoTi Principal Evaluation System. Based on the Levels of Teaching Innovation (LoTi) Framework (Moersch 1995), the LoTi Principal Evaluation system emphasizes proactive instructional leadership, high expectations, and strategic planning as part of a sustainable and collaborative continuous improvement process.

Through this alliance, Teachscape has combined its best-of-breed online observer training and assessment system, tools for conducting in-classroom and video- based observations, and online professional development content with LoTi's research-based solutions for increasing student academic achievement, improving campus cultures, sustaining continuous improvement, and growing support for the tenets of digital age teaching, learning, and leadership.

The Teachscape and LoTi Connection partnership stems from both companies' desire to help school systems improve the accuracy, reliability, and validity of the principal observation process. The research-based LoTi Principal Evaluation system provides a common vocabulary for educational leaders to quantify best practices based on a continuum of didactic policy standards and enhanced teacher and administrator feedback. The instrument contains six (6) domains of professional practice that include 3-8 observation categories with performance criteria that have been specifically aligned to the 2008 ISLLC Professional Standards for School Leaders (Educational Leadership Policy Standards).

The LoTi Principal Evaluation System was developed based on the statistically- significant achievements experienced by students, teachers, and principals of schools following the LoTi School Improvement Model. School systems following the LoTi School Improvement Model—otherwise known as LoTi Digital Age Schools—use the critical components of 21st Century learning as articulated by the Partnership for the 21st Century Skills (i.e., critical thinking, collaboration, problem-solving, and self-directed investigations) to increase student academic achievement in core content areas based on AYP targets. The emphasis is on contextual learning that enables students to transfer their content understanding to real world situations using the available technology assets in the classroom. Teachers and Principals following the LoTi model undergo thorough staff development training and regular informal walkthrough observations that prepare them to meet professional and personal goals.

"Together with Teachscape, we can provide school systems using varied teacher evaluation systems with an authentic companion evaluation for their instructional leaders," said Dr. Chris Moersch, Executive Director of LoTi Connection. "Proactive instructional leadership is the key to elevating student academic achievement and improving classroom instructional practices. The LoTi Principal Evaluation System provides the needed "look-fors" that identify and reinforce instructional leadership in the 21st Century."

For over 27 years, LoTi Connection has provided assessment, evaluation, and professional development services to thousands of school systems throughout the nation and the world. The LoTi assessment has been taken by 150,000+ teachers and principals; over 2,000 Certified LoTi Mentors have been trained to conduct LoTi Framework Orientations; and ten states have implemented LoTi assessments and/or professional development services as part of a statewide adoption.

LoTi Connection is an educational consulting company specializing in the integration of 21st Century skills into K-12 classrooms. Its founder, Dr. Chris Moersch, is the author of the internationally-recognized and research-based LoTi (Levels of Teaching Innovation) Framework which has been used in over 100 research studies and dissertations worldwide. For the past four years, Dr. Moersch has been the principal investigator of the LoTi Digital Age School movement—a school improvement initiative focused on increasing student academic achievement in low performing schools nationally through the strategic integration of 21st Century skills in the core content areas.