Teacher Evaluation System Is Not Helping Teachers Grow As Educators

As schools across the nation look for a uniform method to evaluate teachers’ performances, concerns about both methods are highlighted. NYC is using the Danielson Framework to evaluate teachers this year; some concerns have been brought up by administrators and the teachers union. In the piliot program it was noted by one administrator that “some of her teachers are not scoring as high on the rubric as she would expect — precisely because the rubric expects the same general characteristics in all grades” (Cromidas, 2012). This is because in the Danielson Framework the observer is looking for weather a teacher is doing the behavior or not. Check mark - there is no distinction between a new teacher and a veteran teacher. The other thing that administrators are noting that the “practicing observing teachers using Danielson had proved to be time-consuming” (Cromidas, 2012). It is recommend that they observer spends a number of informal observations lasting at least 15 minutes in the classroom before the official observation and that the report be turned around in 48 hours to the teacher.

As a student you are evaluated everyday, but have you ever desired to be the one doing the grading? This is a thought provoking idea. Teachers grade students on almost everything these days; including participation and behavior. So wouldn’t it be nice to return the favor? Although it may sound like a great idea, it could also be a very bad one. If students were able to grade their teachers it could provide proper and thorough evaluation; help teachers to improve on what they may be lacking, and help parents understand what is going on in the classroom; but at the same time it could prove to be harmful to the student and a good teacher’s career if not implemented correctly. This is why it’s important to recognize the possible positive

Darling-Hammond, L. (2013). Getting teacher evaluation right: What really matters for effectiveness and improvement. Teachers College

Just like this week’s content, my school is a “mixed bag” of evaluations. First, we have our Head Start Program, which is federally funded, so they have their own evaluations. These evaluations consist of “board members” coming in to evaluate/assess the teacher and classroom as well as meetings that the teacher and her paraprofessional have to attend every other month. These meetings help them focus on the current curriculum that their program has in place to ensure that the program is doing what it is meant to do.

After reading the report, one could characterize current teacher evaluation practices as little more than missed opportunities to increase the effectiveness of teachers and assure that the best teachers stayed in front of students. Practitioners generally agreed with the premise of the critique, and confirmed the identified evaluation weaknesses as both common and wide-spread among school districts. Using teacher effect research and the validity of value-added measures as a platform, and armed with the belief that the sample practices were representative of those in districts across the country, the authors of The Widget Effect urged educational leaders and policy makers to implement specific teacher evaluation reforms, many of which informed (or mirrored) those becoming increasingly prevalent in federal and state

In order to ensure that students have the greatest chance for achievement, it is vital that school communities know that they have high quality teachers in place. To accomplish this task, systems have developed that integrate set measures aligning what teachers do and what happens as a result. These may include evidence of student work and learning, as well as, evidence of teacher practices derived from observations, reflection, recordings, artifacts, and various forms of feedback. Educational experts such as Marzano, Danielson, Stronge and others have published examples of evaluation models. While they vary in emphasis and design, they are similar in that they attempt to provide a framework for measuring the impact of a teacher on a student’s learning. Clearly, this is a daunting and challenging task and there is a risk involved in attempting to make something

There are many consequences to evaluating teachers by the rise and fall of students test score such as low morale, teachers willingness to work with low performing students and schools.

Although the same rubric is used for teacher observations, evaluators can differ in their style of rating and what expectations they have for the teacher. This causes an inconsistency between the evaluation of teachers in the same building, let alone in different districts. There are parts of the rubric that are up for interpretation, so there is no way for all evaluations to be scored in the same way. This evaluation can also put a lot of pressure on a new teacher who is unsure of what is expected and may not feel completely comfortable within the job as a first year teacher. A “needs improvement” rating should not be considered unsatisfactory if the teacher is willing to improve and work towards goals set by him or her or the

Countless of students are not being educated as well as they should be. The article argues, the wrong test can ineffectively evaluate quality of strong teachers. Therefore, those teachers become penalized. Whereas, the wrong test can fail to identify a weak teacher. As a result, the student is who suffers in the end. Secondly, the article discusses three primary purposes for the educational testing’s; compare, to instruct, and to evaluate. Comparison allows the educational system to identify score differences among students, whereas instructional testing is an ongoing evidence of a student’s level of achievements. Lastly, evaluation is to determine the quality of teachers. So, if the tests are appropriately implements, students can benefit. However, comparison has dominated the American education system.

Education reform takes on different forms depending on the goals of reformers. However, most will agree their ultimate goal is to positively impact student achievement. Changes in public education continues to increase teacher accountability, as well as, update curriculum standards and standardized tests. The teacher evaluation system is one focus of recent initiatives. While district implement new teacher evaluation methods, skepticism surrounds its effectiveness, in improving teaching, and comprehensiveness, in assessing the multi-faceted role a teacher plays in the lives of students. I have experienced the good, bad, and ugly of the teacher evaluation system of Shelby County.

Teachers are evaluated on how well their students do on tests. This makes teachers teach to the test to keep their jobs. So all year is basically just students preparing for a test that is made to evaluate teachers. Teachers are literally getting paid to prove themselves worthy of their jobs. Teachers can not teach how they want to teach because they need the kids to think and learn certain things. Then because of how inaccurate the students tests are, the teacher evaluation is off as well. Bad teachers can look really good because their students got lucky on the test. In the same way, fantastic teachers can look horrible because their students don’t care about the test. So if the tests are designed to evaluate tests then they are once again

In the state of South Dakota, the legal requirements of the state and school districts when it comes to supervision and procedures, expectations align with both. The state of South Dakota has adopted the Teacher Effectiveness Model along with any district that is state accredited. This model is based on the Danielson framework, which consists of 22 components, clustered into domains one through four (Danielson, 2007). According to this model, teachers from year one to year three are evaluated at least annually and those teachers year four and beyond are evaluated at least every other year. The state formed a work group made up of teachers and administrators who developed an evaluation instrument that will not only be a tool for administrators to use, but also for teachers.

Across the United States, policymakers determine evaluation systems for public school educators. Used as a tool for increasing teacher effectiveness and accountability, teacher evaluation systems vary from state to state as determined by individual state departments of Education. According to Sergiovanni & Starrat (2002), the role of the evaluation process is important in developing teachers’ instruction, which should contribute to academic achievement of students. Evaluation should provide meaningful feedback to teachers, to improve instructional practices and support learning (Kelley and Maslow, 2012).

I agree with your thinking here; there must be a more effective way to assess teacher effectiveness than based mostly on how students perform on a test. I had not considered that teachers are not seen as true professionals I wonder if that may be a part of the push to use student test scores as an evaluative tool for professionalism. Playing the devil's advocate, I can understand how the general public, who have not stepped into the classroom and experienced the demands of teaching would see a benefit in using the test scores as an evaluative tool. From their worldview and limited knowledge test scores appear to be tangible assessment-if students score high this means the teachers and schools are doing their job. However,

The new Teacher Evaluation System implemented by the State Department of Education is in question. There are issues with the like lack of accuracy and unfair evaluation practice because of excessive power in the hands of principals. The whole system was in place to increase the accountability of teachers and align their rating with that of the results of the school, but within a year of implementation one can discover several loopholes in the framework and there are no promising results.