Next-Generation Data Importation: Flexibility for the Future of Your School

The Arizona Framework for Measuring Teacher Effectiveness, Colorado State Council for Educator Effectiveness, The Massachusetts Task Force on the Evaluation of Teachers and Administrators… that which we call “instructional effectiveness” (IE) by any other name would still require accurate student enrollment and demographic information. With apologies to William Shakespeare, widespread interest in measuring the effectiveness of teachers has spawned legislation in many states outlining assessment requirements to guide the evaluation process for effectiveness of instructors and school administrators.

The need to measure progress regularly lies at the heart of instructional effectiveness initiatives and the ability to achieve positive results. To do so, districts will need to ensure accountability for changes within the instructional improvement and instructional effectiveness system to match the student information system (SIS) regularly, throughout the annual assessment cycle. Many state education systems face the question of how to achieve measurable, positive IE results and it can be daunting. But never fear, the Galileo Data Import (GDI) module is here to help! GDI is time-tested, having imported in excess of one million student records since being introduced over ten years ago. In addition to student enrollment and demographic information, GDI can also be used to update Galileo K-12 Online with teacher information, class-level and student user accounts, and IE-relevant course information such as subject area and grade level.

As part of the Galileo K-12 Online Instructional Improvement and Instructional Effectiveness System, all client districts are availed of the GDI module. The purpose of GDI is to allow districts to update student enrollment and demographic information with the frequency needed to support classroom initiatives – whether monthly or daily updates, GDI can meet the need.

Major advantages of the GDI module include:

1. Cost: In the increasingly challenging financial climate many state education systems face questions about how to fund worthy initiatives like IE. Client districts are able to update student enrollment with the frequency necessary to ensure classroom success at no additional cost over the annual Galileo K-12 Online subscription rate.


2. Data Pre-Validation: To start each program year, every district in need of frequent data importation will go through a validation process to ensure the export format meets their needs and the requirements of the Galileo K-12 Online Instructional Improvement and Instructional Effectiveness System. Once this is complete, SIS export files generated using a consistent format are assured of uploading efficiently and without risk to existing Galileo data.


3. Extensibility: Unlike many data exchange frameworks, GDI is flexible enough to accommodate the changing needs of the district SIS and data storage needs – at any point in the program year. This includes changes such as altering the format of a particular field (e.g., class name) up to, and including, the addition of new data fields at any time.


• A key advantage of this flexibility with regards to IE is the ability to add course subject data to the Galileo K-12 Online Instructional Improvement and Instructional Effectiveness System. Whether the information is stored in your SIS or you export a list of courses and update the subject manually, accurate alignment of district courses to the subject being taught is possible with Galileo and GDI.


4. Automation: Many student information systems are capable of scripted export. Add to these a batch FTP transfer to ATI servers and the entire import process can be “hands free” for the district once the initial pre-validation is completed.

The measurement of IE and student growth present the opportunity to perform timely intervention and create dynamic, customized assessments. Continuous measurement, evaluation, and adaptation of the assessment system enable a district to enhance learning for all students. The GDI module sets the table with up-to-date, accurate student data. If you would you like to learn more about frequent updates through GDI, please refer to the K-12 Importation Instructions or contact your Field Services Coordinator at 877.358.7617.

ATI has You Covered with Comprehensive Assessment Options

Whether you need a benchmark or a computerized adaptive test, Galileo® K-12 Online has you covered with its full range of assessment options. As an all-in-one instructional improvement and instructional effectiveness system, Galileo offers a comprehensive assessment system including not only benchmark and computer adaptive tests but also formative, screening and placement tests, plus interim and final course examinations, pretests and posttests, early literacy benchmarks, and instruments documenting instructional effectiveness. Additionally, ATI item banks are aligned with both Common Core and state standards and now contain selected-response, constructed-response, and technology-enhanced item types reflective of planned consortium assessment approaches.

Learn more

ATI Releases Research Brief: Categorical Growth Analysis – A Method Involving the Repeated-Measure T-Test

ATI releases a research brief summarizing current research on Categorical Growth Analysis, a statistical method involving the repeated-measure t-test written by Sarah Callahan, Ph.D., Research Scientist with ATI.

As part of the growing implementation of instructional effectiveness initiatives, districts and schools have expressed a need for information about the growth of students for which each teacher and principal is responsible. To be useful, student growth must be estimated based on valid, reliable student assessments and categorized via robust statistical approaches. Via the Galileo® K-12 Online Instructional Improvement and Instructional Effectiveness System (IIIES), ATI provides districts/schools with a wide variety of valid, reliable assessments including instructional effectiveness (IE) pretests and posttests as well as integrated statistical approaches designed to provide districts/schools with precise information about student growth.

This research brief describes and illustrates the underlying method for one of the statistical approaches developed by ATI to provide information about student growth, Categorical Growth Analysis. Categorical Growth Analysis enables educators to evaluate growth throughout the year. Information about student growth can be accessed along with information about student achievement in Galileo reports and used to guide professional development, student intervention, and other activities. Categorical Growth Analysis supports a fair, constructive approach to educator evaluation that evaluates educators against a defensible standard while providing every educator with the opportunity to succeed. This brief also summarizes the results of a simulation study evaluating the appropriateness of the method underlying Categorical Growth Analysis for a wide range of possible datasets.

Read the full Research Brief.

Customizable Rating Scales and Actionable Dashboard Reporting Technology

School districts across several states have expressed the need to develop, customize, administer and manage implementation of their own teacher and principal evaluation tools. The Galileo Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System (IEAS) addresses this need by giving school districts online access to the Administrator Dashboard with instructional effectiveness widgets.

Among other tools, the dashboard includes: 1) an Educator Proficiency Scale Builder; 2) Proficiency Rating Scale Administration tools; 3) an Educator Proficiency Ratings Progress Report; 4) a Proficiency Rating Results Report; and 5) Staff File Import and View functionality.

These features make it possible for a district to take control over the development and use of teacher and principal performance rating scales aligned to the Interstate New Teachers Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) Professional Teaching Standards and the Professional Administrative Standards from the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC).

In addition, if the district already has a measure of teacher performance, they may upload data from this existing measure collected outside of Galileo or enter the existing measure (with appropriate copyright permissions if applicable) into Galileo for administration and data collection within the system.

Galileo IEAS Dashboard Reports provide school districts with the capability to manage the implementation of rating scales and to gain rapid access to a continuous flow of actionable information not only to identify the proficiency levels of teachers and administrators at the end of the year, but also, to inform professional development decisions to enhance student learning throughout the year.

For more information of the components of the Galileo IEAS, click here.

Striving for Educational Excellence: The Roles of Innovation, Collaboration, and Empowerment

Educational excellence is essential when maintaining and expanding the nation’s competitiveness in today’s rapidly changing global community. The challenges associated with attaining and maintaining educational excellence call for innovative and collaborative initiatives empowering teachers as educators, administrators as leaders, and students as learners. 

In support of attaining and maintaining educational excellence, ATI provides educators with a comprehensive instructional effectiveness system built in collaboration with school districts and in recognition that it is within the local school district and community where the broad sweeping ideas of educational reform are carefully vetted within the context of local reality. It is here where educational stakeholders have an in-depth understanding of the educational needs of students and the professional development aspirations of teachers. And it is here where new policies are transformed into everyday practice. Reform is, after all, a local phenomenon, occurring within each school and within each classroom, one student and one teacher at a time.

Click here to learn more about the ways in which the ATI Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System embedded in the Galileo K-12 Online Instructional Improvement System incorporates innovation and collaboration in empowering educators seeking educational excellence. 

Do you know the benefits of implementing the Galileo Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System?

The premise behind instructional effectiveness initiatives is that good teaching and effective educational management can enhance student learning. The Galileo Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System (IEAS) provides users both analysis and reporting of student achievement data and tools, content, and data analysis to develop effective and defensible educator/administrator evaluation systems. The customizable tools in the IEAS are aligned to educator effectiveness scales such as the Interstate Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC), Model Core Teaching Standards, the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC) Educational Leadership Policy Standards, and individual state department of education standards. Development of the Galileo IEAS has been based both on our more than 25 years of experience and on the needs and requests of users

A brief summary of the benefits provided by the Galileo IEAS is outlined below. Further details regarding benefits are available in the 2012 white paper titled Instructional Effectiveness Assessment.

Benefits include:

• Reliable and valid IEAS assessments in math, reading/English language arts (ELA), science, and writing.
• Standards for non-state-tested grades and subjects are in the system, including subjects such as foreign languages and social studies - meaning instructional effectiveness (IE) assessments can be created and aligned to these subjects within Galileo using items resulting from the Community Item Banking and Assessment Development Project. As the banks are becoming robust, project participants may need to contribute items to the bank when building an assessment.
• Analysis techniques and reports to evaluate student achievement data in the context of educator evaluation.
• Support for IE assessment in non-state-tested content areas such as music, art, and physical education.
• Tools to design customized educator rating scales aligned to educator effectiveness scales such as the INTASC Model Core Teaching Standards, the ISLLC Educational Leadership Policy Standards, and individual state department of education standards.
• Tools to record and report on data from observations, interviews, and other data sources to rate each teacher and administrator on the elements in the rating scales.
• Tools with which each school district may customize the relative weights applied to evaluation scores as recommended by individual state departments of education. These tools allow districts to adjust the weights applied to student performance data and educator/administrator rating elements to determine final effectiveness scores.
• Algorithms and reporting tools that summarize student performance data and educator/administrator evaluation data from many sources to generate an Overall Evaluation Score for each teacher and administrator.

There are a number of ways to learn first-hand about Galileo K-12 Online. You can:

• visit the ATI website (ati-online.com)
• participate in an online demonstration by registering either through the website or by calling 1.877.442.5453 / 520.323.9033 to speak with a Field Services Coordinator 
• visit us at
• 52nd Annual California Educational technology Professional Association (CETPA) Conference October 16-19 at the Monterey Convention Center, Exhibit #K16 in Monterey, California.
• Massachusetts Computer Using Educators and Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents Annual Technology Conference October 24 and 25 at the Gillette Stadium, Exhibit #418 in Foxborough, Massachusetts. 
• 25th Annual Arizona Educational Research Association (AERO) Conference October 26 presenting the luncheon keynote,“Building a Research-Based Approach to Support Local Educational Agency Implementation of the Arizona Framework for Measuring Educator Effectiveness,” Phoenix, Arizona.

We look forward to talking with you online and at events.

Innovative Technology Supporting Innovative Education

ATI is committed to continuous innovation - evident through a number of existing patents and several pending.  During the past year, ATI has built hundreds of new features into Galileo Online, provided at no additional cost to all clients. This fall ATI will release a complete Instructional Effectiveness System, again at no additional cost to Galileo users. The system includes three components:

• comprehensive assessment providing reliable and valid measures of student progress used to determine the value added to student performance by each educator being evaluated;
• educator rating scales built using ATI assessment planning, item banking, scale construction, and Item Response Theory (IRT) technology making it possible to accommodate customized scales that can be continuously updated to improve rating scale validity; 
• an Evaluation Score Compiler combining and differentially weighting indicators of student progress, educator proficiency, and surveys of school climate to produce an instructional effectiveness score for each educator being evaluated.

Dashboard technology puts control of the evaluation process continuously under district guidance.  Data on student performance, teacher proficiency, and school climate are provided automatically, thereby reducing the burden of gathering evaluation data while assuring continuous availability of data.

The comprehensive assessment component provides continuous feedback to guide professional development during the school year while there is still time to make a difference in student learning.

There are a number of ways to learn first-hand about Galileo K-12 Online. You can:

• visit the ATI website (ati-online.com)
• participate in an online demonstration by registering either through the website or by calling 1.877.442.5453 / 520.323.9033 to speak with a Field Services Coordinator
• visit us at 
• Missouri School Boards’ Association in cooperation with Missouri Association of School Administrators Annual Conference September 28 and 29 at the Tan-Tar-A Resort, Osage Beach, Missouri.
• Massachusetts Computer Using Educators and Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents Annual Technology Conference October 24 and 25 at the Gillette Stadium, Foxborough, Massachusetts.

We look forward to talking with you online and at events.

Assessing Instructional Effectiveness for Tested and Non-Tested Areas

The fundamental premise behind instructional effectiveness  initiatives is that good teaching and effective educational management can produce enhanced student learning. In order to assess instructional effectiveness, it is not only necessary to show that teachers and administrators have demonstrated skill in instruction and educational management, but it is also essential to demonstrate that effective instruction and educational management have resulted in improvements in student learning.

In 2011, Assessment Technology Incorporated (ATI) was asked to explore how we could support local implementation of instructional effectiveness initiatives. ATI undertook the development of an integrated Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System (IEAS). The initial IEAS pilot began in the 2011-2012 school year and involved 37 school districts. The success of the pilot provided a foundation for the creation of IEAS.

The Galileo IEAS is comprised of two integrated components addressing the key areas in assessing instructional effectiveness, student outcomes and educator proficiency. As part of our continuous efforts to provide schools with a fully integrated and standards-aligned instructional improvement system, the Galileo IEAS has been fully incorporated into the Galileo K-12 Online Instructional Improvement System (IIS). Our plan is to continue to work in collaboration with districts and charter schools in expanding the instructional effectiveness tools. 

As part of instructional effectiveness, ATI is answering in a number of ways the urgent need for valid, reliable, and fair items in areas not tested on the statewide assessment. For example, ATI Standards Builder makes it possible to enter any set of standards into the Galileo K-12 Online. The standards for non-tested grades and subjects have been entered into the system, including such diverse subjects as music, dance, and physical education. This means that IE assessments can easily be created and aligned to these subjects within Galileo.

Another way in which ATI is addressing the need for reliable and fair items in grades/ subjects not tested on statewide tests is to provide technology to districts and to organizations working on item creation. One partner in this area is WestEd. WestEd is providing a group of districts with item development services including training in the construction and review of items in art, music, and physical education. ATI is providing technology to manage those items including importing them into Galileo, placing the items in banks, retrieving the items for use in assessments, scheduling and delivering assessments for use in schools, conducting psychometric analyses to establish item parameter estimates and to determine the validity and reliability of the assessments, and providing instructional reports of assessment results.

Still another support of IE assessment in non-tested areas is provided through the use of Galileo Automated Scoring Key (ASK) Technology. Galileo ASK Technology enables schools and districts to administer, score (automatically, if a multiple-choice format is used), and report on an assessment that was created outside of Galileo. Such an assessment may be administered either online or with scannable answer sheets.

Read further about the benefits of IE in the February 20 blog post or ATI’s Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System white paper, stressing the critical issues of measuring instructional effectiveness, the importance of reliability and validity in measurement, and an overview of the measurement procedures needed to be in place to effectively implement and help guide local decision-making. 

We welcome the opportunity to speak with you and describe how the Galileo IEAS can be incorporated into your local instructional improvement plans. We can be reached at 877.442.5453.

The Skinny on Instructional Effectiveness System Development and Roll-Out Activities

Have you ever hoped that a new service would be available as soon as it is has become someone’s dream? Have you ever wondered what occurs behind the scenes in preparation for rolling-out a new service? The material below is a very short explanation of the steps involved in bringing ATI’s most recent new service component to Galileo users.

Getting a new service to end users is a very complex process. ATI is currently rolling out the Instructional Effectiveness Assessment System – a new service component in the Galileo K-12 Instructional Improvement System. Would it surprise you to know that the planning for this new service component began over two years ago? As you would imagine, the first step in the process was the recognition that districts would benefit by having a reliable and valid method for measuring the effectiveness of instruction integrated within the context of student education. Once the initial recognition had occurred, ATI management began to flush out defining characteristics that would be important in such a service component. A few of the questions that had to be answered in this phase included: What data should the system contain? How should that data be obtained? How and to whom should the data be reported? What types of data analysis would be most effective in understanding and using the data? How do you add yet another evaluation process without interfering with the educational process? Periodically potential end users were asked to look at the plans as they were being developed and to provide feedback on the emerging plan’s characteristics.

Once the overall conceptualization of the service had begun to take shape, the ATI computer design staff was presented with the defining characteristics of the project. Their tasks included designing the interfaces that would be needed in the gathering and displaying of data in a user-friendly way and which were associated with each of the goals of the project. The computer designers not only had to figure effective ways to display the data gathering portion of the system but they also had to design the ways in which the data could be most effectively presented to those would be using it in data-driven decision making and communication.

As the computer designers moved toward basic design completion, they worked interactively with the ATI software engineers whose tasks included developing the technological solutions required to accomplish the goals of the plan. The IT department was brought into the process as it is their responsibility to ensure that the technology required for all services is available at all times. They evaluated the then current infrastructure to ensure its ability to handle each aspect of addition the new service component. Additionally at this point, the ATI communication staff was introduced to the project and charged first with developing a plan to inform Galileo users of the instructional effectiveness benefits and functionality of the instructional effectiveness system and then to develop supporting materials to communicate these benefits and functionality to Galileo users. The ATI professional development team was also involved at this point as it is their task to provide professional development sessions to assist the ATI field services staff to fully understand the new service and to assist users maximize all tools/services within the Galileo instructional improvement system including new ones.

Toward the later stages of this developmental process, 38 Arizona school districts participated in a pilot of the instructional effectiveness project. These districts are in the process of providing feedback part of which has already been incorporated into the system. ATI is grateful to these districts for piloting the system and for providing excellent feedback to make the system even more exciting.

And so the process goes each time a new service is prepared for the Galileo instructional improvement system. It is a complex set of operations and we love doing it. Hopefully, you enjoy having new service components as they are developed.