AI-powered teacher evaluations
for Montana educators.
Cut evaluation documentation from hours to minutes. EvalScribe is built around the Danielson Framework at the heart of Montana-EPAS, the state evaluation model, drafting the teacher-practice write-up in the framework's own language.
Saved per evaluation
EPAS Danielson domains, built in
To meet ARM 10.55.724
Evaluator-controlled ratings
Three evaluations free — no credit card · Individual plans from $100/year · School & district licensing available
Endorsed by educational leaders
Game changer. Absolute game changer for school admin.
Tobin Davidson · Assistant Superintendent · 40+ years in education
This is amazing. I would pay lots of money for this. I’m serious — it’s crazy good.
Kittie Brown · Assistant Principal
Also endorsed by Dr. Robert Stinson · Glenn Brown · Angie Brandt — read full quotes ↓
Built by a classroom teacher
Founded by a practicing K–12 educator with nearly 20 years in the field.
Montana-specific
Built on Danielson, the framework behind Montana-EPAS.
Privacy-first
Transient processing on Microsoft Azure. Never used for AI training.
Built for workflow
Designed around the realities of being a Montana evaluator.
Montana-EPAS. Built on Danielson — and so is EvalScribe.
Montana is a local-control state. Under ARM 10.55.724, the local board of trustees runs the evaluation, and the Office of Public Instruction publishes the state model — the Montana Educator Performance Appraisal System (Montana-EPAS). EPAS is built on the Charlotte Danielson Framework for Teaching — the framework EvalScribe is built around.
Montana-EPAS: a Danielson-based state model
The Danielson Framework for Teaching provides the conceptual basis for Montana-EPAS, adapted for Montana schools as a professional-growth evaluation system. Its teacher rubric is organized into four domains. EvalScribe maps your observation evidence to the component it supports and drafts a rating and evidence-anchored feedback in the framework's own language.
The four EPAS domains.
Planning and Preparation
Before the lessonKnowledge of content and pedagogy, knowledge of students, coherent instructional design, and designing student assessments.
Learning Environment
The classroomA culture of respect and rapport, managed procedures and routines, clear expectations, and a space that supports learning.
Instruction
Teaching in actionClear communication, strong questioning and discussion, student engagement, and using assessment to adjust instruction.
Professional Responsibilities
Beyond the lessonReflection on practice, accurate records, communication with families, professional growth, and contribution to the school.
Three ways to meet the rule
A Montana district can meet ARM 10.55.724 in one of three ways: use the state model (Montana-EPAS), adopt one of the state-approved model instruments the Office of Public Instruction publishes, or use its own instrument and process that substantially conform to the rule. Districts that adopt a published model are construed to have complied.
The rule requires periodic written evaluations of instructional staff under contract. Each employee has access to the evaluation instrument, the opportunity to respond in writing, and access to their files, and the process is implemented as part of the district's integrated strategic action plan.
Rating levels.
Unsatisfactory
Basic
Proficient
Distinguished
Montana does not mandate a single set of rating labels. The Danielson four-level scale is shown here; Montana-EPAS uses a professional-growth rubric, and your district's instrument sets its own labels. EvalScribe drafts to them.
How EvalScribe handles Montana evaluations
The four Danielson domains behind Montana-EPAS are built into the tool, each with the framework's own language and the distinctions that separate adjacent levels. EvalScribe maps the evidence from your observation notes to the component it supports and drafts best-fit ratings and evidence-anchored feedback, so the teacher-practice write-up is defensible and traceable back to what you observed — ready for your district's instrument.
Scope of the work. EvalScribe drafts the teacher-practice write-up. The summative process — combining formative and summative elements, any local measure of the educator's effectiveness in supporting student learning, and the employee's opportunity to respond in writing — is run by your district under ARM 10.55.724, not the app.
Built for Montana's model. Because Montana-EPAS is Danielson-based and EvalScribe is built around the Danielson Framework, it fits districts using EPAS, the Danielson Framework, or a Danielson-aligned local instrument most directly. Confirm your district's adopted model, and if it would help to see a specific local instrument supported, email [email protected].
How EvalScribe works with Montana-EPAS.
A five-step path from the back of the classroom to a finished, standards-aligned evaluation.
Observe the classroom
Formal observation or walkthrough — capture what you see the way you always have.
Enter notes your way
Type, dictate, or snap a photo of your handwritten notes. Smart Scan converts handwriting to text.
Map evidence to components
EvalScribe identifies which Danielson component each note supports, across all four EPAS domains.
Suggested ratings & comments
Get draft ratings and feedback language in the rubric's own voice, across the four-level scale.
Review & finalize
Edit anything you want, finalize the evaluation, and export a clean PDF for your records.
EvalScribe runs natively on iPhone, iPad, and Mac — work where you are.
Capture notes the way you already work.
No retraining required. Whatever your walkthrough style, EvalScribe accepts it.
Snap a photo
Photograph your handwritten notes mid-walkthrough. Smart Scan OCR converts handwriting to text — even messy handwriting, even pedagogical terms.
Dictate as you go
Speak observations directly into the app. Voice dictation captures what you saw without breaking your eye contact with the classroom.
Type directly
Prefer to type? Enter notes straight into the app — they flow into the same DC-aware drafting pipeline as scans and dictation.
Why generic AI falls short for Montana evaluations.
Pasting your walkthrough notes into a general-purpose chatbot might produce a paragraph that sounds polished — but for Montana-EPAS documentation, "sounds polished" isn't the bar. Defensible, standards-aligned evaluations are.
| Capability | Generic AI (ChatGPT, Claude, etc.) | EvalScribe |
|---|---|---|
| Framework awareness | ✕No concept of Montana-EPAS, its Danielson roots, or the four domains. Treats every prompt the same. | ✓Built around the four Danielson domains behind Montana-EPAS, with the framework's own language. |
| Component mapping | ✕Hallucinates domain and component labels and invents rubric language that doesn't match Danielson. | ✓Maps evidence to the real Danielson components using the actual framework loaded into the app. |
| Local control | ✕No idea Montana districts run their own instrument under a board of trustees. | ✓Built around the Danielson domains behind EPAS, ready for your district's instrument and labels. |
| Scope of the work | ✕Assumes the observation is the whole evaluation, ignoring the district's summative process. | ✓Drafts the teacher-practice write-up; leaves the summative and response process to your district. |
| Written-evaluation rule | ✕No awareness of ARM 10.55.724 or the employee's right to respond in writing. | ✓Produces a clean, defensible written record that fits the rule's requirements. |
| Note input | ✕Requires you to retype everything before the AI can do anything with it. | ✓Accepts typed notes, dictation, or photos of handwritten notes via Smart Scan OCR. |
| Feedback language | ✕Vague, generic comments that could describe any teacher. | ✓Professional, evidence-anchored feedback written in the language of the Danielson framework. |
| Data privacy | ✕Free tiers may use your inputs to train public models. | ✓Enterprise-grade Microsoft Azure. Transient processing. Zero retention. Never used for training. |
| Defensibility | ✕Output you can't trace back to evidence or rubric language. | ✓Every comment is tied to evidence pulled from your notes and the component it supports. |
How much Montana evaluation time could you reclaim?
Tune the inputs to your reality. The numbers update as you go.
You could reclaim approximately
hours per year
Workdays reclaimed
Total evaluations
Based on early EvalScribe users saving an average of 35 minutes per evaluation. Individual results may vary based on your current workflow.
The best way to see it
is to watch it.
Reading about how EvalScribe drafts a Danielson evaluation isn't the same as watching it happen. The demo walks through a real observation — capture, mapping, scoring, and final export — start to finish.
The draft review screen — every comment, rating, and piece of mapped evidence is fully editable before export.
See an example EvalScribe report.
A real EvalScribe-generated evaluation, formatted exactly as it exports from the app. The workflow is the same across frameworks — useful to share with district stakeholders.
Download sample PDFWhat educational leaders are saying.
Real feedback from administrators across roles — from academic coaches to assistant superintendents.
EvalScribe is a tool that every public school principal should use. This resource literally makes multiple people out of administrators, allowing them to focus their energies on precise observation analysis and quality feedback while leaving EvalScribe to handle the mechanics. This tool will remove virtually all of the drudgery from the classroom evaluation process and would represent an excellent use of school funds.
Dr. Robert Stinson
Principal
After seeing a detailed demonstration of EvalScribe, I came away very impressed with both the concept and the execution. The platform provides administrators with a practical way to quickly capture classroom observations and generate high-quality, customized feedback that remains aligned to their evaluation framework and local expectations. What stood out most was the balance between efficiency and quality. EvalScribe has the potential to reduce administrative workload while helping school leaders provide more timely and meaningful feedback to teachers — a tool with considerable promise for schools and districts.
Glenn Brown
Director of Student Services
Game changer. Absolute game changer for school admin.
Tobin Davidson
Assistant Superintendent · 40+ years in education
This is amazing. I would pay lots of money for this. I’m serious — it’s crazy good. I look forward to using it on a regular basis next year.
Kittie Brown
Assistant Principal
Evaluators spend an inordinate amount of time recording and documenting evaluations. This app is easy to use, affordable, and incredibly efficient. It cuts the time spent recording and documenting evaluations down significantly and frees us up to handle other aspects of the job. Plus, the conference suggestions save on prep time when a conference is warranted.
Angie Brandt
Academic Coach
Built by educators, for educators.
EvalScribe was co-founded by a practicing classroom teacher and his wife — a husband-and-wife team with thirty years of combined classroom and business experience.
Anthony Neely, Ph.D.
Co-founder · Product
A tenured K–12 classroom teacher and Professional Learning Lead. District Teacher of the Year, with nearly 20 years in education and three published books.
Andrea Neely, Ph.D.
Co-founder · Business
Associate Professor of Management. Research and teaching in organizational management.
Your evaluation data stays yours.
Observation notes are processed transiently on Microsoft Azure and are not retained on our servers. Your evaluation records live locally on your device. Notes and evaluations are never used to train public AI models. For districts needing a Data Processing Agreement or FERPA attestation, those are available on request.
Simple, transparent pricing.
Try EvalScribe with three free evaluations. When you're ready to keep going, pick the plan that fits your role.
Individual
For a single evaluator on their own device.
Billed annually per user
- Unlimited evaluations
- All supported frameworks, including the Danielson framework
- iOS & macOS access
- 3 free evaluations to start
School-wide
For a school with multiple evaluators.
3+ evaluators
- Everything in Individual
- 10% volume discount
- Unique access code issued to your school
- Easy distribution to your evaluators
District-wide
For districts deploying across every evaluator.
Best value for full deployments
- Everything in School-wide
- 20% volume discount
- Single access code for the entire district
- Direct support contact for rollout
All pricing shown is introductory and may change. For school and district plans, EvalScribe issues a unique access code that the buyer distributes to their evaluators.
Montana evaluations & EvalScribe — common questions.
What evaluation model does Montana use?
Montana is a local-control state. Under ARM 10.55.724, the local board of trustees runs the evaluation, and the Office of Public Instruction publishes the state model — Montana-EPAS — which is built on the Danielson Framework. Districts may use EPAS, adopt another state-approved model instrument, or use their own instrument that substantially conforms to the rule. EvalScribe is built around the Danielson Framework behind EPAS.
What is Montana-EPAS?
The Montana Educator Performance Appraisal System (Montana-EPAS) is the state's model for evaluating teachers and school leaders, developed by the Office of Public Instruction. Its teacher rubric draws its conceptual basis from the Charlotte Danielson Framework for Teaching, adapted for Montana as a professional-growth system organized into four domains. EvalScribe drafts against those domains.
Does Montana require a specific rubric or rating scale?
No single statewide one. ARM 10.55.724 sets minimum requirements — periodic written evaluations, access to the instrument, the right to respond in writing, and access to files — but a district may use EPAS, a state-approved model, or its own conforming instrument, and it sets its own rating labels. EvalScribe drafts toward the Danielson levels behind EPAS and adapts to your district's labels.
Does EvalScribe run the whole evaluation?
No. EvalScribe drafts the teacher-practice write-up from your observation evidence. The district's summative process — combining formative and summative elements, any local measure of the educator's effectiveness in supporting student learning, and the employee's opportunity to respond in writing — is run by your district under ARM 10.55.724, not the app.
Can I use EvalScribe if my district uses its own instrument?
Often, yes. Montana lets districts use their own instrument as long as it substantially conforms to ARM 10.55.724, and many Montana instruments are Danielson-aligned because the state model, EPAS, is Danielson-based. EvalScribe fits those most directly. Confirm your district's adopted instrument, and email [email protected] to check a specific local rubric.
Does EvalScribe replace evaluator judgment?
No. EvalScribe drafts evidence-mapped evaluations and suggested ratings. The evaluator reviews, edits, and finalizes every document. The professional judgment is always yours — EvalScribe just removes the typing.
Can the generated evaluations be edited?
Yes, fully. Every comment, every rating, and every piece of mapped evidence inside a draft evaluation can be edited before you export the final PDF. You are always the last set of eyes on the document.
Is observation data stored?
Your notes are processed transiently on Microsoft Azure and are not retained on EvalScribe's servers. Your evaluation records sit locally on your device under a local-first architecture. Your data is never used to train public AI models. For more detail, see our Privacy Policy.
How is EvalScribe different from ChatGPT or Claude?
Generic AI tools have no built-in understanding of Montana-EPAS or the Danielson framework behind it. They invent components, ignore that each district runs its own instrument, and produce vague comments that miss the level distinctions the rubric requires. EvalScribe is built around the Danielson framework's actual structure — and the evaluator workflow that surrounds it — from capture through final export.
Where can I read the official Montana evaluation sources?
The Office of Public Instruction publishes the Montana-EPAS guides and educator evaluation resources on its Educator Evaluation page. The governing rule is ARM 10.55.724, part of Montana's Standards of Accreditation.
Which other frameworks are supported?
EvalScribe ships with frameworks from all 50 states and Washington D.C., plus general models such as Danielson, Marzano, Stronge, CEL 5D+, NIET, and Kim Marshall. The complete list is available at evalscribe.com/frameworks.
Don't see your question? Reach out via our contact page — we read every message personally.
Spend less time on paperwork.
Lead your building.
EvalScribe was built to help Montana evaluators spend less time documenting evaluations and more time doing what matters: leading instruction, coaching teachers, and walking buildings.
Three evaluations free — no credit card · Available on iPhone, iPad, and Mac