Dive Brief:
- The Los Angeles Unified School District and its teachers union have compromised on a new plan for teacher evaluations, but critics say administrators should not be the only evaluators — even if alternative plans would cost more.
- In reaction to a Los Angeles Times piece about the new evaluation plan, one reader said other professionals are judged by skilled professionals in their fields and teachers should be no different, getting evaluated by other experienced and knowledgeable instructors.
- Another reader, a retired science teacher and department chair, said input from department chairs or veteran teachers would round out an administrator evaluation, as would student evaluations, if handled correctly.
Dive Insight:
The issue of teacher evaluations has become a divisive controversy in the last few years. The Obama administration has pushed teacher evaluations based on standardized tests, which has raised the stakes for the exams and contributed to parent backlash against them. In some schools, teachers were evaluated based on test scores in subject areas they did not teach. In Los Angeles, administrators will be expected to incorporate data, possibly from test scores, but tests will not make up 50% or more of a teacher’s evaluation, as has been the case elsewhere.
There is an understanding that the best teachers have an outsized influence on their students’ academic outcomes and future success. But many other factors do, too. Legislators aiming to get a good return on investment in public schools want to hold the worst teachers accountable, and schools that have the best interests of their students in mind want to offer a staff of highly effective teachers. The problem is finding an evaluation system that fairly measures teacher quality.