By Tom
There's a bill moving quickly through the Washington State Senate that could produce some interesting changes in the way teachers are evaluated. As part of a new project called Sounding Board, The Center for Strengthening the Teaching Profession, the host of this blog, asked a group of National Board Certified Teachers a series of questions regarding Senate Bill 6696. The results are out and some of them are pretty interesting.
One of the questions was about the change from a two-tier to a four-tier rating scale for teacher evaluations. Not surprisingly, 73% of the teachers were in favor of it. For me this is a no-brainer. Most teachers always get a satisfactory evaluation. Getting an unsatisfactory is a Big Deal for everyone involved, and principals need a pretty good reason to go there. Having four tiers opens up the playing field and makes evaluations much more useful in terms of fostering growth. I've taught for 25 years. Every evaluation I've ever had was satisfactory, which could mean anything from "adequate" to "excellent." I'm not averse to criticism, and I like to know where I fall short and how I could become a better teacher. Maybe that will soon happen.
Another question was about the use of student growth data in teacher evaluation. A whopping 66% of the teachers were in favor of it. However, in a follow-up question, 73% of the teachers who favored the use of student data said that they want the data to come from classroom-based assessments. In other words, these teachers don't mind using student data as a basis for evaluation, but they want the data to originate from tests specifically targeted to their students. The survey results show that a slightly smaller percentage favor the use of school-based assessments, slightly fewer favor district-based tests, and even less favor state tests.
This seems like wishful thinking. Don't get me wrong; I understand where teachers are coming from. Although state test results get published in the paper and get most of the attention; for a teacher, those results aren't really very useful. What's useful are the smaller assessments that are directly tied to what we just taught. That's what we use to determine what to do next. Danielle's WASL scores don't help me improve her reading fluency. Timing her as she reads aloud does; and when I track that data over time, I can gauge how well different interventions and techniques are working in regards to her reading. That's how real teachers really use assessment.
It's a little bit like baseball. (Isn't everything?) Fans and owners want to see results. They want to see their team ahead in the standings and ultimately winning the World Series. But looking at the standings isn't particularly helpful for individual players. A pitcher who wants to improve looks at data related to his pitching velocity, his accuracy and the horizontal movement of his fastball. That's the kind of data that can help him. Knowing his team is in third place doesn't tell him anything.
And If you asked a ballplayer how he should be evaluated, he would probably want to focus more on the data that was under his control. Similarly, teachers would rather be evaluated on the stuff that they can control. I have a lot more control over Danielle's reading speed than I do over her score on a state reading test that I can't even look at. Obviously, the two aren't unrelated. A pitcher's fastball is bound to have some impact on his team's success, but there's a lot of other factors that also contribute to a team's success, just as there's a lot of other factors that contribute to a student's success on a high-stakes test. A kid's score on a test in fourth grade, after all, reflects the work of five different teachers, the kid's parents and, of course, the kid himself.
But in the end it doesn't reallly matter. Stakeholders such as lawmakers, administrators and parents want (and deserve to see) results. And they're not going to be satisfied with a set of numbers that shows how Danielle's reading speed has increased over the past year. They'll want to see how well Danielle did on the standardized reading test.
I think teachers are going to have to get used to the idea that standardized test scores are going to be used to evaluate them. It may or it may not be fair, but that's life.
And who knows, maybe it'll help school communities pull together and work more like a baseball team.
I agree R. I feel like I am a good teacher and I see the results of this with kids that are willing to work. However, I have a group of kids this year who are exceptionally unmotivated, with very little influence from home as to a reason to become more motivated. Half of my students in this class are currently failing math, while only 3 in my 1st period are failing. Same class, similar kids in terms of WASL scores….but very different in terms of work ethic. I’ve tried lots of different strategies to try to make the lessons more engaging and relevant, but to no avail. If I was evaluated based on this group, I fear I would get a poor evaluation. But, if I was evaluated based on the hours I’ve spent contacting these kids’ parents, staying after school to offer help, etc., I feel I would get an excellent reiew. How will this new evaluation system take groups and kids like this into account?
R: I like this phrase: asking for their best on what they can control. This is key, though certainly some will debate what is and isn’t in the teacher’s control.
I am in favor of rigorous teacher evaluation, but I also think that taxpayers and stakeholders don’t realize the tab for such a service. To do it well and with validity will take administrators or teacher leaders whose sole job is that task. We may complain about administration sometimes, but the fact is that they too are stretched far too thin. My AP, I’m quite confident, would like to spend a lot more time observing and even coaching teachers as an instructional leader, but he’s saddled with a trillion other responsibilities as well. I really have appreciated the feedback he’s offered me as well as the genuine desire he has to help me reflect and become a better teacher. But, when a kid brings a knife or starts a fight or even curses out a teacher, the AP gets pulled from the classroom where he can be an instructional leader and is forced back to his office where he must be detective, judge and jury. And, then there are the IEP meetings, the angry parents, the team meetings, the mediation of staff disputes, the forecasting for next year, and the list goes on.
Good point, R. I agree that there has definitely been a shift away from student accountability and toward teacher accountability since I was a kid. When I got bad grades my parents never blamed the teacher.
I agree that the tests are here to stay, and we will be evaluated through them, like it or not. Most people who are stakeholders really do not understand how education works. They give us their kids, all kinds; gifted, lazy, spoiled, disabled, and we are to turn them out like clones. Its like being given a lot of car parts, old, new, dented, etc., and using every part to build a luxury sports car. Doesn’t always work. Then we are evaluated.
There are some aspects of evaluation that most have not even thought of that could transform the evaluation process, and that is what the teacher can do to help and encourage the students. What interventions were used? How was communication kept open and documented? Once the teacher has done everything he/she can, the evaluation should be a good one, reguardless of the outcome. I truly believe that outcomes would improve if teachers were evaluated on their efforts, not just on what the kids can do. Give the teachers a set of parameters that will stretch them as well as rewrd them, and miracles can occur. Not everyone will agree with me, but I have seen students do poorly just to make a teacher look bad.
Several years ago, I had the opportunity to go to Japan and view the educational program. There is an interesting paradigm there. The teacher’s job is to present the material and the studen’s job is to learn. We dot not have that paradigm here enough, and the students expect good grades, reguardless of their effort.
I am not trying to get teachers off the hook, but think we could do a better job of encouraging to be better. Judging them on standards of what they do, what they can control, and asking for their best at what they can control, will improve education faster than just being judged on how they perform on a test. The quality will come.