Teacher Evaluations

I see the newspapers are all agog over the proposed new teacher evaluations being considered by the state. I don't know the specifics, but I'm not sure I like what I do know.

First, half of the evaluations are based on administrator observations.  I guess someone has to "observe," but from my experiences, most administrators are not capable of effective evaluations/observations.  I've explained why often enough; there's not need to repeat myself.

Second, the evaluations are based on student performances.  This is silly for a variety of reasons.  So, a teacher who gets a class that is unable to read, write, and think and will be poorly evaluated if the students don't do well?  What's to prevent students from tanking on state tests to get even with teachers they don't like, that is, teachers who demand hard work and give low grades if it's not don't?  (And let's not pretend this won't happen.)  Even more, as usual, if performance is based on results on some test(s), teaching will become merely preparing for the test(s).  Of course it will.  If teachers' evaluations are largely determined by test results....yeah.  And most teachers don't have the courage to, en masse, stand up to such silliness.  And this leads to, not free thinking, but indoctrination.  Who will determine what's on the test?  Right...politicians and educators who want to curry favor from the politicians.

Quality education is not "Test!," "Test!," "Test!"  I've said all this before.  I understand why the public is dissatisfied with the schools and teachers.  Believe me, I know.  I worked with many teachers and administrators who deserve all the criticism leveled at education in general.  There have been so many silly and even stupid programs introduced to the schools--from "Self-concept" and "Values Clarification" to "Everyday Math" and "Diversity " ("All cultures and all people are deserving of respect and acceptance.") and everything in-between.  Standards and rigor all but disappeared and more recent teachers have been the products of those lack of standards and rigor, so......  In many ways, teachers and education get what they deserve.  (I find it puzzling why so many people take aim at teachers, often rightfully so, but why most administrators seem immune from criticism.  They are equally incompetent--or often more so.  Beats me.)

I laugh when I hear businessmen and people working in the private sector claim that if they "were ineffective in my job, I'd be fired in a moment."  Bah, that's a crock.  For a long time I have been convinced that many businesses, esp small businesses, succeed only because of inertia.  Have you noticed the "outstanding" employees at your local fast food place, your grocery store, etc.?  OK, maybe that's different and I'm not trying to run anyone down, but how many of them are "effective?"  Don't you always count your change?  Don't you always double check your order?  Gee, how effective were the banks and other lenders?  How effective were the auto executives?  How effective is Wall Street?  Without their buddies the politicians covering for them, well, maybe we could see how effective they really are/were.

There's a lot wrong with education, but current knee-jerk reactions won't do anything to improve it.  I don't think the solution is all that difficult, at least the framework for improvement.  It's the implementation of the solution, which is likely to encounter all sorts of resistance from all sorts of people.  I think it's pretty easy to identify quality teachers, if the evaluator is knowledgeable and forthright.  Most people know who their best teachers were--not necessarily their favorites, but their best ones.  Maybe I'm naive in that.  (I just read a review of one of my Amherst professor's books.  I didn't like him, for several reasons, but admit he was a pretty good teacher, if only because of the incisive comments and questions he posed in class and on returned papers.  Again, he was never one of my favorites, but he was good and I was lucky to have had him.)

Again, maybe I'm coming from another universe, but our top colleges such as Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Duke, Princeton, and, yes, Williams and Amherst are never criticized.  In fact, they are touted as the best in the world.  Let's toss in public universities such as U Virgina, U North Carolina, and our own U of Michigan, among others.  Top foreign students leave their countries to study at our best schools.  We know why they are "the best."  Why can't we apply what we do there to how we teach at lower levels?  If, as I'm sure people will think, we "can't do that because these are different situations," maybe we need to ask, "Why are they different?"  Then we can address the "differences."