(Today is my 3rd of 3 blog posts up at Education Week)

When information flows freely, people make lists. They reorder it. For example, in Massachusetts, when MCAS was first created, the state released school data alphabetically. Newspapers immediately published the data in order of test scores. After years of push by the school superintendents, the state responded in 2009 by releasing MCAS growth scores gains.

This data created some interesting new narratives, like this.

Perhaps in the near future well see the same thing with teachers. Individual teacher data is being published. So next, well see more lists of their names. A first reaction will be, just like with any ratings, will be a mix of attacking the publishers and the top performers, like this:

In the initial weeks after the article came out, Aguilar said he went through hell. Theres a lot of jealousy and hate out there. People said things like, Theres this guy who thinks hes all good just because hes Latino and hes friends with the kids. How do you know hes not cheating?

But evidently things thawed a bit.

Steinbeck (the principal) asked Aguilar if hed be willing to lead a school-wide training session. Aguilar said her request blew my mind. The demonstration to a classroom full of teachers in February was well received. So he went grade by grade giving sample lessons as the teachers looked on. Within six weeks, third-grade proficiency in reading and comprehension rose from 20% to 30%, Steinbeck said.

Id guess many EdWeek readers strongly oppose this sort of publication. Some dont believe the data actually tells us anything of value (i.e., theyd say Aguilar is likely no better or worse than other teachers); others think the data is modestly useful, but imprecise; it should be used somehow but not be made public. Nonetheless, I think this trend is likely to continue, and will result in a couple of developments.

First, teachers like Aguilar will be headhunted. As coaches. As leaders. As simply higher-paid teachers. As teachers who, in lieu of increased compensation, get to call their own shots in terms of whatever they want the most curriculum freedom, assistance with certain tasks, flexible funds for student projects or trips. This will create some upward wage pressure. Thats what happens in other professions. It happens with universities (based on professor prestige).

Second, top teachers will also get some of the same treatment high-scoring schools are right now: hundreds of visitors.

Do many individual teachers get hundreds of visitors? I dont think so yet. If you believe, as I do, that the field is way too steeped in ivory tower theory, and not enough research from the best schoolteachers, research on teaching methods will advance if we can get past the whole school level and think more deeply about the individual teacher level, in part because the transaction costs will be lower to find teachers who, based on imperfect data, at least seem to be unusually effective.

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