Wake County Schools

Teachers Effectiveness

North Carolina is reporting on the effectiveness of teachers across the State, which is measured using the North Carolina Educator Evaluation System. This system engages teachers, principals, and their evaluators in dynamic discussions that recognize educators' individual strengths and focuses on how they can improve their craft. The reports show ratings of the performance of teachers who were evaluated during the school year.

Important Information:

Please keep the following in mind when reviewing the educator effectiveness data.

• North Carolina’s Educator Evaluation System is a growth instrument. It identifies the knowledge, skills, and dispositions expected of teachers, and measures the level at which they meet the standard as they move from ratings of “not demonstrated” to “distinguished.”
• As lifelong learners, teachers and school leaders are constantly learning and growing. Since educators (like all employees) always have room to improve, it is uncommon to see a school in which the majority of teachers are distinguished. It is expected that educators in a school or district would be distributed across the rating categories.

Standards for Educator Effectiveness

1. Teachers demonstrate leadership.
2. Teachers establish a respectful environment for a diverse population of students..
3. Teachers know the content they teach.
4. Teachers facilitate learning for their students.
5. Teachers reflect on their practice

Educators are assigned effectiveness ratings based on their overall performance on the five observational standards and the overall growth rating (where available). The classification process is the same for educators whether they are on a comprehensive, standard, or abbreviated evaluation process. The three rating categories are listed below with a description of how they are derived

1. Needs Improvement – the educator demonstrated a less than proficient rating on one of the five observational standards and/or demonstrated growth that did not meet expectation (if an individual growth measure is available for that educator). For educators without a growth measure, only the observational standards are used in the determination of effectiveness.
2. Effective – the educator demonstrated a rating of at least “Proficient” on all observational standards and the educator met or exceeded expectation on the growth measure (where available). If the educator demonstrated a rating of “Proficient” on one of the five observational standards or only met expected growth, then he or she is classified as “Effective” regardless of greater than proficient ratings on the other standards. For teachers without a growth measure, only the observational standards are used in the determination of effectiveness.
3. Highly Effective – the educator demonstrated a rating of “Accomplished” or “Distinguished” on all five of the observational standards (or both ratings if on an abbreviated evaluation plan) and exceeded expectations on the growth measure. For teachers without a growth measure, only the observational standards are used in the determination of effectiveness.

For more information about Standards and EVAAS ratings, please see theEducator Effectiveness Model webpage.

Educator Qualifications

North Carolina is reporting on the qualifications of teachers and principals across the State. Below are definitions of the categories used in the charts and tables.

1. Beginning Teachers – beginning teachers are defined as teachers who are in their first three years of teaching (either in NC or other state). NCDPI tracks the number of beginning teachers in a school because these teachers require more support during these critical years in order to develop into highly effective teachers. On average, beginning teachers are less effective than more experienced teachers, so it is critical that schools have a balance between beginning teachers and highly effective, experienced teachers who can mentor them.
2. Inexperienced Principals – similar to beginning teachers, inexperienced principals are administrators who are in their first three years of serving as the administrative lead of a school. In contrast to beginning teachers, inexperienced principals might have served for many years in an assistant principal (or some other leadership) role. Inexperienced principals often require additional support from the central office or other, more experienced principals to support them in their new roles. Inexperienced principals are reported only at the district level; NCDPI does not identify individual principals of a school as inexperienced or not. Reporting on principals’ experience in Charter Schools presents a challenge for the State. Because charter school principals are not required by law to hold a NC principal license, the State does not have a systematic method of tracking their experience. As a result, charter school data on principal experience may be missing from a charter school’s report card.
3. Permit to Teach/Emergency License – Permits to teach and emergency licenses are two types of temporary licenses for teachers. These licenses are generally granted to individuals who have sufficient content knowledge/work experience in a given field, but have not received any formal training in pedagogical practices. These two, non-renewable licenses allow a prospective teacher to enter the profession while completing the requirements to be a fully licensed teacher. Because these licenses are issued with unfulfilled requirements, teachers who hold these licenses are monitored by the state to ensure that they are progressing toward a full teaching license.
4. Provisional Licenses – licensed teachers in North Carolina are able to add additional teaching areas to their licenses on a provisional basis. Because these teachers have been fully trained in appropriate pedagogical practices, the teacher need only demonstrate a deep understanding of the content knowledge associated with the additional license. Teachers can demonstrate this mastery of the content in two ways – 1) pass the NC content licensure exam associated with the provisional license area, and 2) earn 24 credit hours in the relevant content area from a State Board of Education-approved educator preparation program. Until all requirements to clear the provisional license are met, a teacher who is teaching a subject for which he/she holds a provisional license, is deemed out-of-field.
5. Out-of-field teachers – NCDPI deems teachers out-of-field if the teacher is teaching a course for which he/she does not hold a clear license. Teachers who hold a Permit to Teach or an Emergency License are deemed out-of-field for all subjects taught. Teachers who teach a course(s) for which they hold a provisional license are deemed out-of-field for that course(s) only. Because holding a provisional license does not necessarily cause a teacher to be out-of-field, NCDPI must evaluate every course a teacher teaches in order to determine which courses are out-of-field and which are in-field. NCDPI is working on a systematic approach to measuring this phenomenon in NC schools. Until such time as that approach is finalized, NCDPI will not be able to report accurately on this measure.
6. High- and Low-Poverty Schools – A “high-poverty school” is defined as a school in the top quartile of poverty in the State, and a “low-poverty school” is defined as a school in the bottom quartile of poverty in the State. This information will be a key indicator of equitable access to non-novice, qualified teachers and school leaders in schools across the State. Because not all schools are included in the high-poverty and low-poverty designations, the sum of teachers or principals reported on these measures will not equal the total number of teachers or principals in the district in most cases.

Average Number of Teachers

The average number of teachers in similar grade levels.

Fully Licensed Teachers Percent

Percent of all teachers with similar grade levels who have met all education and testing requirements.

Teachers with Advanced Degrees

Percent of all teachers in similar grade levels with license areas above the four year degree level (Bachelor).

One Year Teacher Turnover Rate

The percent of teachers in March 2024 teachers in similar grade levels in the school system who were not employed as a teacher in March 2025.

Experience

Average number of teachers in similar grade levels in the school system by years of experience as a teacher.

Chronic Absenteeism

Chronic Absenteeism represents the percentage of students in a school or district who are chronically absent from school. A student is defined as chronically absent when they are enrolled in a North Carolina public school for at least 10 school days at any time during the school year, and whose total number of absences is equal to or greater than 10 percent of the total number of days that the student has been enrolled at any school during a given school year.

Student chronic absence is a risk factor for adverse outcomes. Student chronic absence differs from both truancy and average daily attendance. Student daily attendance is the percentage of students present in a school each day. Student truancy measures unexcused absences only. Student chronic absence refers to missing so much school, for any type of absence – excused, unexcused, disciplinary – that a student is at risk of falling behind.

This definition applies to all students enrolled in a school, including those who have not reached the compulsory attendance age, as well as those who have reached or exceeded the compulsory attendance age.

Suspension and Expulsion Rates (per 1000 students)

This chart describes some of student behavior and discipline issues:

• Short-term Suspensions - Number of short-term suspensions per 1000 students
• Long-Term Suspensions - Number of long-term suspensions per 1000 students
• Expulsions - Number of expulsions per 1000 students

Rates per 1000 are calculated by dividing the total number of crimes or suspensions/expulsions by student membership at the State, District, or School level, and then multiplying by 1000. This statistic allows for general comparison of one entity to another by controlling for differences in student population size.

Since this is a rate and not a percentage, the >95 and <5 masking rules do not apply. Masking rules apply when a subgroup or student membership is less than 10. There were instances where the insufficient data rules were applied.

Additional data can be found here https://www.dpi.nc.gov/data-reports/discipline-alp-and-dropout-data.

Rates of Criminal Acts, Bullying, Law Enforcement Referrals, and Arrests (per 1000 Students)

Rates of Criminal Acts, Bullying, Law Enforcement Referrals, and Arrests (per 1000 Students)

• Criminal Acts - Number of criminal acts per 1000 students
• Acts of Bullying and Harassment – Number of acts of bullying or harassment per 1000 students
• Reports to Law Enforcement – Numbers of reports to law enforcement per 1000 students
• School Arrests – Numbers of school-related arrests per 1000 students

Rates per 1000 are calculated by dividing the total number of crimes or suspensions/expulsions by student membership at the State, District, or School level, and then multiplying by 1000. This statistic allows for general comparison of one entity to another by controlling for differences in student population size.

Since this is a rate and not a percentage, the >95 and <5 masking rules do not apply. Masking rules apply when a subgroup or student membership is less than 10. There were instances where the insufficient data rules were applied.

Additional data can be found here https://www.dpi.nc.gov/data-reports/discipline-alp-and-dropout-data.