How can AI help Virginia evaluators write TPES teacher evaluations?
How can AI help Virginia evaluators write TPES teacher evaluations?
Virginia evaluates every teacher through the same statewide framework — the Teacher Performance Evaluation System, built on eight Uniform Performance Standards. Seven of those standards are documented through observation and evidence, and that observation write-up is the part an evaluator writes most. That's where AI can genuinely help: drafting the write-up, mapping evidence to the right standard, and putting it in the Guidelines' own language. What it can't do is set Standard 8 or produce the summative rating. This post walks through where AI helps with the TPES, where it doesn't, and what to look for.
What the TPES is
Virginia's Teacher Performance Evaluation System (TPES) is built on the Guidelines for Uniform Performance Standards and Evaluation Criteria for Teachers, approved by the Virginia Board of Education on March 18, 2021, and developed with Stronge & Associates. School divisions follow the Guidelines in building their local evaluation systems.
The 2021 revision is worth knowing about, because it changed two things a documentation tool has to get right: it added a new performance standard, and it moved to a new recommended rating scale.
The eight performance standards
The TPES defines effective teaching across eight performance standards:
Standard 1 — Professional Knowledge: understanding of the curriculum, subject content, and the developmental needs of students.
Standard 2 — Instructional Planning: planning using standards, effective strategies, resources, and data to meet the needs of all students.
Standard 3 — Instructional Delivery: using research-based strategies to engage students and meet individual learning needs.
Standard 4 — Assessment of and for Student Learning: using a range of assessment strategies and data to measure, document, and guide progress.
Standard 5 — Learning Environment: creating a safe, respectful, well-managed environment conducive to learning.
Standard 6 — Culturally Responsive Teaching and Equitable Practices: demonstrating a commitment to equity and providing culturally inclusive, responsive instruction for all students.
Standard 7 — Professionalism: maintaining professional ethics, communicating effectively, and taking responsibility for professional growth.
Standard 8 — Student Academic Progress: the teacher's work results in acceptable, measurable, and appropriate student academic progress.
Standard 6 is the 2021 addition. The Board of Education created it to implement House Bill 1904 and Senate Bill 1196, which require teacher evaluations to include an evaluation of cultural competency. Standards 1 through 7 are documented largely through observation and evidence; Standard 8 comes from student-growth data.
The rating scale
Here is the detail a generic tool almost always gets wrong. The 2021 Guidelines recommend four levels: Highly Effective, Effective, Approaching Effective, and Ineffective. Effective is the expected professional standard. This scale replaced Virginia's older labels, and because divisions may modify the labels within their local systems, a good tool has to use the current recommended scale and adapt from there.
After the observation: where the work piles up
The observation is familiar work for a Virginia evaluator. The write-up that follows is where the hours go: taking fragmentary notes and organizing them as evidence against the right standard, settling on a defensible rating, and writing feedback a teacher can act on — across seven observation-based standards, and across a caseload.
Where AI helps with the TPES write-up
The strongest fit between current AI and Virginia's system is that standards-based documentation.
AI handles three parts of it reliably. First, it turns fragmentary notes into coherent, evidence-anchored prose in the Guidelines' language — the difference between "she checked in with the groups that were behind" and a sentence tied to Standard 6 or Standard 4. Second, it maps evidence to the right standard, including evidence that supports more than one. Third, it holds consistency across a caseload, so the same quality of evidence lands in similar territory from teacher to teacher.
For Virginia specifically, the value is drafting in the standards' language and on the current 2021 scale, so the write-up is ready to inform the summative evaluation rather than something you have to translate first.
Where AI doesn't help — and what stays with the evaluator
The honest scope follows from how the TPES is built.
AI cannot set or score Standard 8, and it cannot produce the summative rating. Student Academic Progress is documented from growth data through the division's process, and the summative rating combines the standards with Standard 8 and any local weighting.
AI cannot supply an evaluator's professional judgment — what the evidence really shows, how a lesson fit a longer arc, how a rating fits the teacher's year. That stays with the evaluator, who remains the last set of eyes on every rating and comment.
And general-purpose AI has no built-in understanding of the TPES. Paste notes into a consumer chatbot and it will invent standards, reach for outdated rating labels, and skip the 2021 equity standard entirely. For a statewide framework tied to a formal summative rating, those errors surface at the worst possible moment.
What to look for in an AI tool for Virginia
A few questions worth asking before committing a tool to this work.
Does the tool actually know all eight performance standards — including Standard 6, the 2021 equity standard — or does it produce generic "good teaching" language?
Does it use the current 2021 scale (Highly Effective, Effective, Approaching Effective, Ineffective) and adapt to your division's modified labels?
Does it stay in its lane, drafting Standards 1 through 7 and leaving Standard 8 and the summative rating to the division?
Where does your observation data live — on the vendor's servers, or used to train models?
How EvalScribe handles the TPES standards
EvalScribe is built around all eight performance standards. An evaluator captures notes by typing, dictating, or photographing handwriting (Smart Scan OCR converts it to text), EvalScribe maps that evidence to the standard it supports, and drafts a rating and evidence-anchored feedback across Standards 1 through 7 — using the Guidelines' own language on the current four-level scale. Every rating and comment is fully editable before you finalize it, and the evidence stays traceable to the note it came from.
Two scope notes, because the TPES calls for them. First, EvalScribe drafts the observation-based professional-practice standards. Standard 8 (Student Academic Progress) and the overall summative rating are determined by the division from student-growth data, not the app. Second, EvalScribe uses the 2021 recommended rating scale and adapts to your division's modified labels and local weighting.
Beta testers report saving 30 to 60 minutes per evaluation versus writing the documentation by hand. Across seven observation-based standards and a full caseload, that adds up to dozens of hours back — hours that can go to the coaching conversation the system is built to support. More detail on the Virginia workflow is available at evalscribe.com/virginia.
Frequently asked questions about the TPES and AI
Does EvalScribe support Virginia's TPES? Yes, for the observation-based standards — all eight are built in, and EvalScribe drafts the write-up across Standards 1 through 7.
What are the current rating levels? Highly Effective, Effective, Approaching Effective, Ineffective. Effective is the expected professional standard; divisions may modify the labels.
What is Standard 6? Culturally Responsive Teaching and Equitable Practices, added in 2021 to implement HB 1904 and SB 1196.
Does EvalScribe handle Standard 8? No. Student Academic Progress is documented from growth data through the division's process.
Does EvalScribe produce the summative rating? No. It drafts the observation write-up; the summative rating is determined by the division.
If you're evaluating teachers in Virginia, see how EvalScribe drafts across the TPES standards at evalscribe.com/virginia. Questions, or a school or division license? Reach the team at [email protected].
References
Virginia Department of Education, Teacher Performance and Evaluation (the Guidelines for Uniform Performance Standards and the TPES Handbook)
Guidelines for Uniform Performance Standards and Evaluation Criteria for Teachers, approved by the Virginia Board of Education March 18, 2021 (the eight standards and the recommended rating scale)
Culturally Responsive and Inclusive Education Practices, VDOE (Standard 6, added to implement House Bill 1904 and Senate Bill 1196)
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Page maintained by Anthony D. Neely, Ph.D. — practicing K-12 educator with nearly 20 years in the classroom, 2025–2026 Walker County Distinguished Teacher of the Year, and co-founder of EvalScribe. Framework details verified against the Virginia Department of Education's Guidelines for Uniform Performance Standards and Evaluation Criteria for Teachers (2021).
Last updated on August 6, 2026.
