Denise Lavinia Ratiu

A 5th grade teacher at Anatola Avenue Elementary in 2009

These graphs show a teacher's "value-added" rating based on his or her students' progress on the California Standards Tests in math and English. The Times’ analysis used all valid student scores available for this teacher from the 2002-03 through 2008-09 academic years. The value-added scores reflect a teacher's effectiveness at raising standardized test scores and, as such, capture only one aspect of a teacher's work.

Overall value-added effectiveness

Math effectiveness

English effectiveness

This chart shows where teachers in this effectiveness category fall on a distribution of all teachers’ scores.

Compared with other Los Angeles Unified teachers on the value-added measure of test score improvement, Ratiu ranked:

Least effective overall.
Least effective in math. Students of teachers in this category, on average, lost about 10 percentile points on the California Standards Test compared with other students at their grade level.
Less effective than average in English. Students of teachers in this category, on average, lost about 3 percentile points on the California Standards Test compared with other students at their grade level.

Ratiu's LAUSD teaching history

2002-03 through 2008-09 academic years

Anatola Avenue Elementary, 2009 - 2004

Denise Ratiu's Response:

I care deeply about all of my students. This is not an accurate reflection of my teaching effectiveness. It doesn't measure how I touch the lives of the children I teach every day. I instill a love of learning in my students. I teach them to be critical thinkers. I inspire them, encourage them and motivate them. I am helping to raise well rounded children-body, mind and spirit. As a nation, we need to come together with our teachers, parents and community to produce amazing human beings and productive citizens, not just good test-takers. It is true that we need to improve the education in the USA, however giving more tests is not the answer. If our main focus is on teaching our children to be good at taking tests, what will happen to our creaters, inventors, builders, artists and scientists? Be careful what you push for. Lastly, I think that publishing my full name and place of work is a violation to my safety, my rights and totally unconstitutional.

The Times gave LAUSD elementary school teachers rated in this database the opportunity to preview their value-added evaluations and publicly respond. Some issues raised by teachers may be addressed in the FAQ. Teachers who have not commented may do so by contacting The Times.