This quantitative and qualitative study sought to examine the factors that teachers in a poor socio-economic, high-minority, urban, inner-city school district determined were important when gauging their effectiveness in the classroom. The study focused on the selection of specific factors by approximately seventy-five teachers from seven of eight middle schools in an urban, inner-city school district who teach English/Language Arts and/or Mathematics. The question guiding the research sought to find what the criteria were that these urban educators would identify as important in evaluating their effectiveness. A list of eighteen criteria was pre-established at the eighth middle school in the district and was given to these educators. They were to select what they believed were the five most important factors when gauging a teacher's effectiveness in the classroom and give them a weighted percentage. They also answered an open-ended question regarding achievement tests and how they could be taken into consideration when gauging a teacher's effectiveness. Their responses were then compared across performance groups based on three district benchmark tests and the CST. Groups were differentiated by student performance on these exams, in addition to general student performance on the CST, and whether or not they met the AYP Target Growth for the 2011--2012 school year. This study found that of all criteria, Classroom Management and Lesson/Content Delivery received the most selections by the participants, with Classroom Management being considered the most important more often. This held true for the differentiated performance groups as well. Not every particular performance group selected Classroom Management over Lesson/Content Delivery, but one of the two was always the top selection among all criteria. In reference to Student Achievement, the participants were less favorable when having the option to select it from the list of criteria, though more favorable when having the opportunity to explain how it could be fair to use as a measure of a teacher's effectiveness in the classroom. Many participants showed a willingness to use student achievement as a measure should their concerns be addressed. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]