Problems in American Education - Part 14: Teacher Evaluation
One of the things we try to do as human beings is to simplify problems in order to make them more manageable. This has definitely been the case with our efforts to improve the process of teacher evaluation, and that idea does have some merit; but, when coupled with pressures brought to bear by the teacher unions, the combination has created some very counterproductive results.
Evaluating teachers is, at best, a very complicated process, especially when considered in light of the tenure laws that protect teachers after their first few years on the job. For some reason, and I think it has something to do with that pressure from the unions, the tradition in most school settings is to evaluate teachers largely on the basis of what is observed by an administrator in the classroom several times a year while classes are being taught. While that may seem like a common sense approach and one that satisfies those who would reduce teaching to a very mechanical and measureable practice, it is my contention that such a practice falls far short of being effective in determining whether or not a person should be a teacher.
Further complicating the question is the legitimate question of why you evaluate teachers. Is it simply a hire/fire process or does it have something to do with improvement of instruction? I like to think that it is the latter that we should emphasize; but I cannot deny that there is also an underlying question about the suitability of the teacher in question to pursue his or her career. My feeling is that the unions, in protecting teachers from the vagueries of more abstract criteria, have sought to keep the criteria simple and almost strictly confined to classroom performance. The states, ironically, have also sought to simplify the process in order to apply clear minimum standards during the early years of a teacher’s career. The Beginning Educator Support Training (BEST) program in Connecticut is a very good example of this. It is a very good program in that it puts a strong working emphasis on young teacher preparation during their first few years and it insures that certain mechanical standards and supports are maintained.
Such programs, however, do have serious drawbacks associated with their application. The BEST program, for instance, takes the concept of accountability and stretches it to a rather demanding level when it expects so much from young teachers in their first couple of years on the job. While most of these young people are just trying to get their feet on the ground as rookies and second-year professionals, they are faced with very demanding bureaucratic hoops they must navigate through in order to maintain their certification. I had to wonder on some occasions whether this process was as much professional at it was political under the umbrella of the level of accountability for teachers demanded by society.
My much bigger question, however, has to do with whether or not we are measuring the right things when we evaluate teachers. When an administrator visits a classroom to observe a teacher, he normally is confronted by a plethora of distorted situations. The teacher (especially if he or she is very young), of course, is very nervous. Not a good thing for determining the competency of that teacher in a normal situation. The teacher normally knows the administrator is coming (sometimes there is a contractual requirement that the teacher be told the administrator is coming) and, therefore, prepares a “very special” lesson designed to impress. Human nature, but not in the best interests of objective evaluations.
The kids in the class also tend to act differently when the principal or other administrator is there, further slanting what is being observed. Sometimes the kids rally to support a teacher they like, realizing that the teacher is being evaluated. Other times, kids will actually try to undermine the plans of a teacher they do not like. This may say something in itself, but it does not help the administrator in getting a clear perception.
The point, of course, is that a truly objective, and, very importantly, a truly comprehensive evaluation of a teacher through classroom observations is practically impossible no matter how much pre-planning and post-conferencing go into those observations.
Actually, I will go one step further. I even question whether such a process even attempts to emphasize the right things in really determining the value of a teacher. I first became suspicious about the credibility of the traditional teacher evaluation process when I noticed that there were numerous occasions when teachers who I knew were great teachers, who really reached the kids in many different ways, did not really measure up when it came to “good mechanics.” Conversely, I saw teachers whose mechanics were outstanding, but who were not very effective. Admittedly, this perception is somewhat subjective; but that is my point, you sometimes need to use more subjective criteria to understand what makes a good teacher. As an administrator, my feeling was that part of my job was to make a reasoned number of subjective judgements about such things; but, when an administrator followed that philosophy, he or she would often be confronted with problems from the teacher unions.
One example of what I mean by all of this kind of evaluation. I had a student teacher a number of years ago before I went into administration. He was terrific. He was a friendly, “big-bear” of a young man who had a sincere affection for children and who could relate to them. He loved them and they loved him. As a result, he was effective and got the most that was possible out of his students. In addition, it was clear that he was very commited to teaching and he always showed it in the very professional manner he conducted himself.
One day, a woman who worked in our district, and who was a BEST coordinator, offered to do me a favor. She offered to observe John (not his real name) and give him some pointers about what he would need to do in order to do well in the BEST program once he started to work as a hired teacher. I agreed, and she went about her business, observing John in a couple of his classes. I was shocked by what she said after the observations. She came to me and said that John had serious problems, that he was not following the prescribed methods required by BEST and that he would definitely run into trouble during his first and second years of teaching.
I debated the issue with her, explaining that he was one of the best young teachers I had seen; but she insisted that he had to realize that major changes were needed. I felt I had a responsibility to go over the results with him, but I assured him that I did not agree with them and that I thought he would be a fine teacher. To make a long story short, I ran into John about three years later at a conference. He was proud to tell me that he had just been named as his district’s “Teacher of the Year.” I do not believe that he had changed his approach measureably as a result of the criticisms, but I was not at all surprised that he had met with such great success.
The lesson in all of this actually has three conclusions associated with it. One is that you cannot replace administrative judgement and experience with any foolproof mechanical system when evaluating teachers. The second is that there is much more to look at in what makes a good teacher than you can observe in a limited number of classroom observations. The third is that a good administrator needs to look beyond the classroom in determining what makes a good teacher. You cannot tell much about a person’s heart by watching them perform before kids in a very artificial environment. Actually, you can probably tell much more by watching the same teacher as he interacts with kids in the hallway and with colleagues on an ongoing basis during the school day and after school. You can tell more about a teacher by observing his or her obvious commitment to education than you can by simply looking at cold, hard data.
Over a very long career in education, I interviewed hundreds potential teachers. This process, in itself, is closely related to projecting whether or not you believe an individual will be a good teacher in your school. There are many different theories about what you should look for and consider when hiring. My ultimate conclusion, and the thing I would emphasize whenever I hired a teacher, was to look for evidence of character. As one central office administrator once told my wife, who is an elementary school principal, he would only look for one thing. Did he think the person being interviewed was a nice person? “You can teach the rest,” he concluded.
Evaluating teachers is, at best, a very complicated process, especially when considered in light of the tenure laws that protect teachers after their first few years on the job. For some reason, and I think it has something to do with that pressure from the unions, the tradition in most school settings is to evaluate teachers largely on the basis of what is observed by an administrator in the classroom several times a year while classes are being taught. While that may seem like a common sense approach and one that satisfies those who would reduce teaching to a very mechanical and measureable practice, it is my contention that such a practice falls far short of being effective in determining whether or not a person should be a teacher.
Further complicating the question is the legitimate question of why you evaluate teachers. Is it simply a hire/fire process or does it have something to do with improvement of instruction? I like to think that it is the latter that we should emphasize; but I cannot deny that there is also an underlying question about the suitability of the teacher in question to pursue his or her career. My feeling is that the unions, in protecting teachers from the vagueries of more abstract criteria, have sought to keep the criteria simple and almost strictly confined to classroom performance. The states, ironically, have also sought to simplify the process in order to apply clear minimum standards during the early years of a teacher’s career. The Beginning Educator Support Training (BEST) program in Connecticut is a very good example of this. It is a very good program in that it puts a strong working emphasis on young teacher preparation during their first few years and it insures that certain mechanical standards and supports are maintained.
Such programs, however, do have serious drawbacks associated with their application. The BEST program, for instance, takes the concept of accountability and stretches it to a rather demanding level when it expects so much from young teachers in their first couple of years on the job. While most of these young people are just trying to get their feet on the ground as rookies and second-year professionals, they are faced with very demanding bureaucratic hoops they must navigate through in order to maintain their certification. I had to wonder on some occasions whether this process was as much professional at it was political under the umbrella of the level of accountability for teachers demanded by society.
My much bigger question, however, has to do with whether or not we are measuring the right things when we evaluate teachers. When an administrator visits a classroom to observe a teacher, he normally is confronted by a plethora of distorted situations. The teacher (especially if he or she is very young), of course, is very nervous. Not a good thing for determining the competency of that teacher in a normal situation. The teacher normally knows the administrator is coming (sometimes there is a contractual requirement that the teacher be told the administrator is coming) and, therefore, prepares a “very special” lesson designed to impress. Human nature, but not in the best interests of objective evaluations.
The kids in the class also tend to act differently when the principal or other administrator is there, further slanting what is being observed. Sometimes the kids rally to support a teacher they like, realizing that the teacher is being evaluated. Other times, kids will actually try to undermine the plans of a teacher they do not like. This may say something in itself, but it does not help the administrator in getting a clear perception.
The point, of course, is that a truly objective, and, very importantly, a truly comprehensive evaluation of a teacher through classroom observations is practically impossible no matter how much pre-planning and post-conferencing go into those observations.
Actually, I will go one step further. I even question whether such a process even attempts to emphasize the right things in really determining the value of a teacher. I first became suspicious about the credibility of the traditional teacher evaluation process when I noticed that there were numerous occasions when teachers who I knew were great teachers, who really reached the kids in many different ways, did not really measure up when it came to “good mechanics.” Conversely, I saw teachers whose mechanics were outstanding, but who were not very effective. Admittedly, this perception is somewhat subjective; but that is my point, you sometimes need to use more subjective criteria to understand what makes a good teacher. As an administrator, my feeling was that part of my job was to make a reasoned number of subjective judgements about such things; but, when an administrator followed that philosophy, he or she would often be confronted with problems from the teacher unions.
One example of what I mean by all of this kind of evaluation. I had a student teacher a number of years ago before I went into administration. He was terrific. He was a friendly, “big-bear” of a young man who had a sincere affection for children and who could relate to them. He loved them and they loved him. As a result, he was effective and got the most that was possible out of his students. In addition, it was clear that he was very commited to teaching and he always showed it in the very professional manner he conducted himself.
One day, a woman who worked in our district, and who was a BEST coordinator, offered to do me a favor. She offered to observe John (not his real name) and give him some pointers about what he would need to do in order to do well in the BEST program once he started to work as a hired teacher. I agreed, and she went about her business, observing John in a couple of his classes. I was shocked by what she said after the observations. She came to me and said that John had serious problems, that he was not following the prescribed methods required by BEST and that he would definitely run into trouble during his first and second years of teaching.
I debated the issue with her, explaining that he was one of the best young teachers I had seen; but she insisted that he had to realize that major changes were needed. I felt I had a responsibility to go over the results with him, but I assured him that I did not agree with them and that I thought he would be a fine teacher. To make a long story short, I ran into John about three years later at a conference. He was proud to tell me that he had just been named as his district’s “Teacher of the Year.” I do not believe that he had changed his approach measureably as a result of the criticisms, but I was not at all surprised that he had met with such great success.
The lesson in all of this actually has three conclusions associated with it. One is that you cannot replace administrative judgement and experience with any foolproof mechanical system when evaluating teachers. The second is that there is much more to look at in what makes a good teacher than you can observe in a limited number of classroom observations. The third is that a good administrator needs to look beyond the classroom in determining what makes a good teacher. You cannot tell much about a person’s heart by watching them perform before kids in a very artificial environment. Actually, you can probably tell much more by watching the same teacher as he interacts with kids in the hallway and with colleagues on an ongoing basis during the school day and after school. You can tell more about a teacher by observing his or her obvious commitment to education than you can by simply looking at cold, hard data.
Over a very long career in education, I interviewed hundreds potential teachers. This process, in itself, is closely related to projecting whether or not you believe an individual will be a good teacher in your school. There are many different theories about what you should look for and consider when hiring. My ultimate conclusion, and the thing I would emphasize whenever I hired a teacher, was to look for evidence of character. As one central office administrator once told my wife, who is an elementary school principal, he would only look for one thing. Did he think the person being interviewed was a nice person? “You can teach the rest,” he concluded.
posted by Friar4 at 4:19 AM
1 Comments:
I agree with you that there is a problem with evaluating teachers. Looking back at my college years, I know for a fact that I've learned quite a bit in the classes where I received lower grades. If fact, I know for a fact that I've learned more than those who received higher grades because of the way they relayed the information back. Some people receive higher grades because they're good test takers, but they may not retain it or truly learn the material. While I'm in favor of grading (I know there are those who disagree with the grading system), there sometimes is too much emphasis in how many A's and B's were issued. My purpose in college was to learn (if I received an A or a C, so be it).
I realize that high school learning is much different than college learning and that there is a lot of pressure with getting funding and getting kids to college, where the grades are important. When I went to speak to an old high school teacher's class (he asked if I would talk to them about computers), I found that each of the students had more computer knowledge than I had (and I was a computer programmer). They found it fascinating to learn from someone who was actually in the field rather than the teacher. However, I was teaching them the same thing this teacher had taught me (and I know for a fact, he taught them too, but they really didn't believe that he knew what he was talking about)! So, I learned that it's about the approach. Kids are funny. They believe who they want to believe. However, for me, the bottom line for evaluating teachers is deciding what the students learn, not evaluating the teacher's style. Easier said than done.
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