During the 2013-2014 school year, the New Jersey Department of Education established legislation which ensured a revision to the teacher evaluation system by attempting to accurately assess the effectiveness of teachers. The Teacher Effectiveness and Accountability for the Children of New Jersey Act (TEACHNJ) stimulated the implementation of the AchieveNJ Act as a way to encourage positive changes to the practice of teaching and to encourage increased student learning. The AchieveNJ Act provides guidelines for rigorous teacher evaluation based on data collected from teacher observations, student growth objectives, and student test scores on state-wide assessments. The purpose of this generic qualitative research study was to understand "How do special education teachers who teach severely disabled students describe their experiences with the AchieveNJ Act?" Thematic analysis, specifically inductive analysis, utilized raw data collected during semi-structured interviews of 12 educators from two special service school districts in New Jersey. Analysis identified the themes: personal attributes, social interactions and dynamics of the classroom, and organizational aspects. Further analysis identified the sub-themes: negative teacher practice, positive teacher practice, waste of time, stress, motivation, suitability for students, outside influences, administrator support, validation, and team work/peer support. Themes revealed: teachers are motivated by the needs of their students, teachers do not believe state-mandated assessments are the best indicators of achievement of students who are severely disabled, the importance of timely and meaningful post-teacher observations, and a desire for designated time for peer groups to interact and share ideas. [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://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]