By Mark
Unlike too many schools, we are in a position to hire. Last week, we interviewed candidates for two positions in my department–one replacing an irreplaceable veteran moving on to retirement, the other filling a new position resulting from enrollment growth.
In total, we had over 70 applications submitted.
We narrowed it to the interview pool, and each interview was impressive enough to warrant an offer. That's a good problem to have.
In a break between candidates, my administrator, fellow humanities teacher and I started talking about how we would answer the questions we were posing to these candidates. We were asking them to deconstruct their lesson planning process, evaluate their own teaching, outline not only their management philosophy but also the practices that they find successful or challenging. We asked about standards, technology, collaboration, pedagogy, parent relationships, discipline…and more.
Obviously, when looking for a job a good candidate will expect to have to put all this on display. A well prepared candidate will have already anticipated this kind of scrutiny and be ready with details about his or her own practice.
And in the past, the reality has been that after the job interview, most teachers are never asked to do that depth of thinking about their own practice. Ever. Again. The interview was the gate, we said the magic words, and we passed through into our classrooms where we could shut the door and be the professionals we proposed ourselves to be in that interview.
I've said before that the reason I love teaching has as much to do with the intellectual complexity of the task as anything else. For me, that intellectual complexity is rooted in the challenge of working with dozens (or hundreds) of different individuals, each of whom I am charged with moving forward toward a literacy goal we may or may not each value equally. Like many teachers, I constantly think about what I am doing, how it is working, what to change, and how to improve. This disposition is what drew me to seek NBPTS certification, and why I find sitting in hour upon hour of (good) candidate interviews to be oddly energizing. I often sit and listen to job candidates' answers and want to know more, and more, and more. Talking about and thinking about teaching is how I wrestle with the complexity of it all–it is how I personally chart new courses toward perpetual improvement.
The interview is a necessary conversation. It is the gate, the pass-through, the check-off preceding the real work. It forces thinking and reflection that, for many teachers, isn't forced again as long as we stay in that job unless we choose it. This year, as part of the pilot for our new evaluation process, I've experienced and seen teachers digging in to that kind of thinking again.
For the majority of the teachers I work with in the pilot, the process has been profound and positive. It has been this way not because our evaluators are treating our conversations like "interviewing for your job," but because they are taking the time to talk to us, probe our thinking, and get us to expose and deconstruct the aspects of our practice that will propel us to better work. This would never have happened if my district had chosen to try to force the "new" model of evaluation in to the "old" systems, seeking the path of least resistance or easiest administration.
It is not easy work, but it is the right work. I'm excited about the way we're approaching it and dismayed to hear rumors of other districts trying to look for the fastest, easiest way to turn evaluation back into a checklist, rather than a conversation.
I know as an educator I crave authentic conversations about teaching. There has to be a deep trust to make ourselves vulnerable that way, however. It is so hard to achieve that balance with someone who is your evaluator. Evaluators must also have the disposition toward these honest conversations. It is so important to also remember that even seasoned teachers need validation and support– those tools help create a safe space to share challenges and failures. Although I am willing to take criticism, sometimes the emphasis on improvement seems to drive the conversation toward pointing out a laundry list of things I should have done that I didn’t. It shouldn’t be that way, even it we’re discussing not-my-best-lesson-ever. Sounds like your school has found a way to strike that delicate balance. I enjoyed this entry.
Very cool that you are interviewing and hiring teachers for next year at this point of the school year!
Lots of districts were piloting new evaluations this year–often with volunteers interested in the experience. It’s going to be difficult but important work next year, as evaluations leave the pilot phase, to maintain the sense of positivity and growth that often (but not always!) has been the hallmark of many pilots.
A key to this is how well evaluators transition to the role of “coach” rather than “manager.” For these conversations to work, it needs to involve the teacher talking, not listening. The person doing the talking is the person doing the learning.
This is one of the reasons I love having student teachers. Being forced to deconstruct and explain what I’m doing and why I do it helps me constantly evolve.
I “opted in” to Seattle’s new evaluation system three years ago, so have been grappling with our measurement, based on Charlotte Danielson’s work, and find it to be a good work out. My administrator has us list our evidence beneath each area of the rubric, a long, long bulleted list of things I did to personalize instruction, or honor cultural diversity, or use assessments to inform instruction. It’s not easy, but it forces me to identify the things I did that worked, like laying out all of my clothes and making a pile to keep a pile to share and a pile to throw away.
What I love MOST about these conversations, or articulating the rationale behind a choice, is that it means that we need to do away with the old, “If it’s a packet it’s bad” mentality. If you use a worksheet, and you have a very clear justification for that choice, great! I’ve known so many teachers who were challenged for a choice, and freaked out because their instructional creativity was stifled when all they had to do was justify it.