The hot topic in education this past week was how we grade the teachers:
o Principals say they aren't ready to evaluate teachers under new systems: States and the federal department of education are demanding teacher evaluations be more rigorous but principals fight back that they have very little support for this in terms of both training and resources to implement.
o Governor of New York says let's grade teachers regardless of preparation for Common Core. It's good to know that state boards are still independent, or are they? In New York the Board of Regents who had proposed putting aside teacher evaluations that are connected to student scores on the new Common Core Standards. But Governor Cuomo bullies them to stop. So, even if we haven’t trained the teachers and their jobs depend on these evaluations, in part, on student performance on brand new tests, teachers still should be punished, so says Cuomo.
More teacher evaluation stories:
o Colorado lags in implementing teacher evaluation system, which may actually be a good thing. The state passed the law 4 years ago but only began implementing this year. The slow roll-out may make it so the that there is better understanding of the system and development of it. Only time can tell.
o In Tennessee, teachers push back against law makers on teacher evaluation systemciting too high a linkage between student test scores and the evaluation. Back when the state won a Race to the Top grant from the federal government, teachers agreed to evaluations that included student test scores, but as implementation comes into play, the teachers say the state proposal is not what they originally agreed to.
The focus on grading our teachers has been a focus of the Obama administration and law makers around the country. Certainly, we have all had that teacher that was terrible, and so it is an easy sell to say that such evaluation systems will get rid of the bad teachers. Maybe, maybe not? The answer will be in the implementation, which researchers agree should not be tied to student test scores which are a largely imperfect measure of teacher-value.
Also in the news this week:
K-12
Common core rebellion continues– states setting own standard as push back to widespread adoption of common core
Spending on professional development for math teachers yields little to no returns. A review of math professional development concludes that districts and schools are just guessing when trying to improve teachers’ skill in math instruction.
Testing season approaching and states rebelling including California
Teachers hammered in North Carolinaby Republican run state legislature; latest move is to eliminate tenure, cap salary bump for master’s degree, and eliminate class size limits.