Indy Democrat has a post about the recent teacher evaluation reports showing that 87% of Indiana teachers were in the top two categories. The post indicates that the low fail rate has caused skepticism by Rep. Behning and State Board of Education board member Gordon Hendry.
Per Hendry:
“I find it hard to believe that a system of evaluation where only a handful of people are said to need improvement is accurate or effective,” at-large board member Gordon Hendry said. “Clearly, the system failed.”
Per Behning:
“We didn’t think it was possible for a D or F school to say all teachers are effective or highly effective,” State House Education Committee Chairman Bob Behning said. “We thought [the school ratings] would keep schools somewhat a little more honest.”
There are a number of possibilities. Maybe the teachers aren’t, by and large, the problem in schools where kids are failing. Maybe chaotic home lives and a social setting that doesn’t value education, combined with a tattered social safety net contribute more to struggling schools than the merits or lack of merit of particular teachers. No offense to the fine teachers and administrators in the West Lafayette school system, but I’m of the opinion that you could likely put some fairly bad teachers in our system, and the students in our area would, by and large, emerge well educated. Teachers are just one variable in a very large system, and the metrics we use to evaluate teachers and schools have never been very well thought out in terms of controlling for all of the variables that are well outside the control of the school system.
But, we have a rush to measure things; often in hopes of confirming preexisting biases and sometimes in the more venal hope of transferring gobs of public money from a constituency that donates and votes for the other guy to friends and well-wishers of one’s own political campaigns.
I tend to agree that a metric which lumps almost the entire population being measured into one or two categories probably isn’t calibrated in a way that provides much utility. But, first we need to clearly articulate what the hell we’re trying to measure. Then we need to test the tests to see if they actually measure that thing.
The response is absolutely based on the idea that teachers are terrible and terrible teachers are NEVER fired because they are protected by the union.
Of course, the truth doesn’t match this and it makes them mad.
The other issues I see is the fact that they should have built a 5 tier scale. The way the current scale as evolved, there is no place for someone who “meets expectations”. Highly effective implies best of the best, effective (in the way it has evolved, not the way it was originally built) implies above average, improvement necessary implies below average and ineffective implies terrible.
With this scale, there is no place for “just ok” or “average” and so those people get lumped in to effective.
Oddly enough, the State ignored their own internal performance appraisal rubric that allows for a 5 tier scale of: Outstanding, Exceeds Expectations, Meets Expectations, Needs Improvement, Does not Meet expectations.
Of course, that decision was likely by design as opposed to a simple mistake…
Any explanation of this situation that exceeds seven words will be ignored by the politicians and the public.
tl;dr
Doug, could you explain that/ I’m in the dark.
It’s Internet slang for “too long, don’t read.” I was making a small joke because your statement itself was longer than seven words.
I guess folks who refuse to read or think anything about the issue will dump anything said here in the can. Actually a good point.
Managers at State jobs are instructed to rate their employees low in regards to the above mentioned 5 tier gradation. Only upper management has relative freedom to rate. This prevents too many pay increases or bonuses at the top end of scale, while leaving free the option to eliminate employees without embarrassment.