I found this NYTimes article from the Sunday magazine (9/5/10) very interesting and case-study-relevant to yesterday’s lecture. The article discusses “back-to-school-time” and how parents often fight to get their children into classes with the best-rated teachers. In the past, the most highly-regarded teachers have been talked about by word-of-mouth… however, the article discusses a new approach taken in Los Angeles where an economist analyzed seven years of student scores in a local school district and then used statistics to reveal trends. This information was then used to form a public “ranking” of all teachers based on scores… and was later published in a local newspaper. You can only imagine the media’s domino effect on parents’ opinions and their subsequent reactions to the enrollment of students in certain classrooms…
With the introduction of the No Child Left Behind policy (NCLB), it seems to me that measuring student performance is very much a part of the education movement to ensure that our nation is reaching yearly milestones by testing student’s ability, thereby rating a schools’ ability to have students meet state and national goals. (It is to my knowledge that school districts typically report on grade level progress toward these goals and do not specifically tie this information back to individual teacher names).
In true essence of the public sector, I think this ranking-structure is a reactionary response to the introduction of the NCLB policy. I think the articles’ economist example makes a good point that during a time where students’ test-scores are important, ranking teachers by score-achievement is not a completely unreasonable consideration. However, it does leave out many variables (e.g. students’ social skills, slower learners, etc.) that suggest that solely relying on quantitative data will not give us sufficient information to judge a teacher based on a test ranking…
I’d like to pose a question to the class: As the education sector evolves, should more specific teacher accountability and measurement structures be place? What might they look like and how might this affect the future of education?
Shikha Dalal
In my opinion teachers and educators should not be immune to achievement standards in their profession. Most people have certain goals they must reach each year regardless of the sector in which they work. Whether it be the production of x number of widgets or increasing revenue generated by x percent, we are each hired to do a job. In the case of teachers, they are hired and paid to educate. If students are failing to achieve certain educational milestones, the responsibility lies with the teacher and they should be held accountable. Now as you point out their are social and environmental factors that are often not considered but the measurement structure can be designed to account for these distinctions. Making teachers accountable for the progress of their students may be what we need to begin seeing real change in success/failure rates among students throughout the city and country.
ReplyDeleteAmanda Talty
I think the argument that a standardized test is the best way to judge a teacher is inherently flawed on it's face. The biggest problem in my mind is the resulting "teach for the test" attitude that takes over most teachers. When their jobs depend on the results of one test, they will focus like a laser on that one test. I grew up in NY where the Regents statewide tests play a large role in teacher and school evaluation, and this mentality permeated throughout the teachers, especially new teachers. Some of the older teachers who were around before the dominance of standardized tests were more creative in their approach than the newer teachers who were more worried about keeping their jobs.
ReplyDeleteIn a broader sense, it is important to have bright line distinctions and some sort of base for evaluation. Sadly, no one has yet to come up with an idea better than standardized testing, as flawed as the idea is.
In a similar vein, I saw this NYT article today:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/07/education/07teachers.html?hpw
The general concept in is intriguing and it will interesting to see how it develops.
While I do agree with Amanda in principle, I think a little more analysis is needed, not because her thesis is off (it is on point) but because there are so many varibale factors that a one size fits all measurement structure may not be able to be designed that is effective, so a carefully considered evaluation model should be created. In this regard I agree Shikha, the ranking structure is reactionary.
ReplyDeleteThe article does point to some of the potential flaws with ranking teachers, and how the system is ripe for manipulation. For instance, if a principle is looking to remove a teacher he could simply assign the teacher some slow learners, which would adversely affect the teacher's score. If a teacher is also coping with a large class size and budget cuts then the teacher may only be able to bring some students up to barely passing.
I believe that it is also the responsibility of a parent to look out for the wellbeing of their own children, and ensure that their children are doing the homework and must work with teachers if there is a problem. It is NOT solely a teacher's responsibility to ensure every student passes because if students are not doing the work they will fail, or if they have other problems going on they could fail. If parents are not engaged then what is a teacher to do? Concerned with keeping a job a teacher might only teach a student what they need to pass the test but forget about teaching other valuable life lessons.
Another factor are the students on testday. A bright, but nervous student might not test well, or the student might be feeling a little off, in which case the score might be lower than normal.
So, I would argue that an appropriate measurement might be a portfolio method - looking at a teachers accomplishments in addition to the test scores, as well as other factors. This would reveal that some teachers have other strenghts that can be utilized.
As a theoretical for instance - a teacher might be really good with shy kids who are slow learners struggling to learn to read. This teacher may not be able to get a student high socres on standardized testing, but this teacher might be very useful in helping a student with anxiety associated with learning to read and would thus equip the student for some future successes. Why would we get rid of someone with that kind of skill? It is a real value-add to the student.
Another thought - when students are asked to evaluate teachers, tougher teachers tend to get rated more poorely by students and easier teachers more favorably. Also, teacher evaluations are done at the end of a year, so if there are areas needing improvement the students who filled out the survey do not benefit, future students do. This is revealing because if it were the only evaluation method used teachers might tend to grade more leniently.
I am curious about the question of how parents evaluating teachers might also have an influence, and in researching the question came across a study that advocates for mid semester evaluations. For me it suggests the need for continued monitoring and evaluation of teacher performance to measure smaller milestones, continued progress and growth. Granted, the study focuses on college level, but I think the principle is applicable because it does suggest that it is hard to evaluate teacher success effectively. http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Student+perceptions+of+teaching+evaluations.-a0181365765
So back to the main point, if a teacher is teaching for the test and then grading more leniently then the students are being short changed in the long run. They may miss out on other valuable lessons. In designing any measurement standards for teachers it is imperative to look at a variety of factors - are there trends in that teacher's performance that can be indicative of problems, or conversely unnoticed successes?
-Ken