Teacher Evaluations are a huge issue right now. How do we evaluate a teacher in the performance of their job? Some people think test scores are the answer (most educational experts disagree, for good reason). In order to answer this question, let's look at how some other industries evaluate employees. These are all jobs that I have held, or hold now.

1. Cook - I worked my way through college as a cook for two different restaurants, one independent, and one a national chain (The Chart House). Our evaluations were based on the following areas: attendance, on-time to work, attitude, skill (making the food correctly), ability to handle stress during busy times, interaction with other employees, and ability to follow directions from management.

2. Paramedic - I have been in EMS for 24 years. I have been a volunteer and a paid medic. The paid service (AMR) evaluated employees every year to decide if we would get the full raise, or only part of it. We were evaluated on attendance, on-time for work, appearance, attitude, interaction with other employees, ability to follow directions from supervisors and they also looked at any issues we had with patient's, the public, other agencies, and the hospitals. They did NOT use the outcome of our patients (similar to using test scores in evaluating teachers). If we did what we were trained to do, following protocols, and the patient still did worse, or died, we were not penalized for it. If there were any issues found with our patient care, they counseled and retrained the person. If it was a serious issue, there was an investigation into the issue. In most cases, the medic was retrained, unless grossly negligent. Rule #1 in medicine is that patients get worse and die. Rule #2 is that medical professionals can't always prevent rule #1. We do our best and follow protocol and training

3. EMS-Instructor - I have been an EMS-Instructor for 12 years and an Instructor-Trainer for 8 years. I evaluate new instructors all the time, and I also help evaluate the instructors on staff at our training center. I teach the instructor courses and evaluate students during the course. They get evaluated by their mentor instructors in real classes. The one thing we do NOT use to evaluate our instructors is the test scores of their students on the National test. No one instructor is responsible for a student's learning, just like in education. We evaluate the instructors on content knowledge, lesson activities and pedagogy, student engagement, classroom management, attitude, attendance/punctuality, and student evaluations.We do multiple assessments of new instructors and then we continually assess the effectiveness of our instructors. Our training center has high standards and we expect our instructors to live up to those standards. Instructors are counseled and assisted with any areas of need. Only those who do not improve after multiple attempts at being helped are not brought back.

4. Engineer - I was an engineer for 10 years before becoming an educator. I was a project engineer and had employees working for my team that I had to evaluate, and I was evaluated by my supervisors. We were evaluated on a variety of areas, similar to the other industries above. If our design failed or had problems, we weren't fired or chastised, we were expected to fix the problem and offered help and support to do that. We weren't held responsible for the actions or performance of the people building our design. This is how education should be.

Evaluation criteria: job knowledge and skills, quality of work, organizational skills, problem solving, communications, flexibility, teamwork, personal development. Then the employee and supervisor would have objectives for the employee to work on for the next evaluation, a Person al Action Plan for improving any areas of need, and employee feedback and input into the evaluation. Our current evaluation forms for teachers are similar.

Managers were trained in how to evaluate their team members. They had very specific tools and resources to use to do the evaluations. They saw what their team members were doing on a daily basis. Administrators need to see and observe teachers more often than many do now.

5. Educator - Our evaluations are currently based on administrator observations (1 formal and some informal). We are evaluated on content knowledge, lesson plans and objectives, pedagogy and lesson activities, assessment, and classroom management. There is a structured support plan for improvement also. The problem is that there are not enough observations done, administration is not trained on truly evaluating an educator, and student work is rarely evaluated.

I believe that we need administrators, and not the same one all the time, observing teachers more often, and we need more than just test scores, objectives on the board, etc. evaluated. More emphasis should be placed on what the students are doing in the class, how they are learning, and what they are producing. Look at the students' entire portfolio of work in a class.

I also think that administrators need more training on how to evaluate teachers. It needs to be objective for most of it, with some subjective areas. However, no one evaluation should be punitive for a teacher. Multiple administrators need to evaluate a teacher, and a teacher needs to be given support and training to improve in areas of need. Many times, teacher evaluations are too subjective, and personal issues come into play when they have no place there.

The evaluation of educators should never be based on test scores. There are too many factors that affect a student's performance on a test that has nothing to do with their teacher. Plus, no one teacher is responsible for the everything that student knows or doesn't know.

Educators should be evaluated on the following areas, and by multiple people:  content knowledge, lesson plans and objectives, pedagogy and lesson activities, student engagement, assessment, and classroom management, effective use of technology and resources, innovative lesson ideas and projects, student portfolios and student evaluations (like we have in college). The student evaluations should only be used to find and address issues, not as a punitive measure.

The main focus of the evaluations and observations should be "are the students learning?" and "how can we improve student learning more." Period.

Some new laws around the country (and proposed in CT) are changing teacher evaluations to be based on on administrators' opinion and test scores. Neither of which is effective or accurate.

The people evaluating educators need to be trained on how to do the evaluations and what to look for. Educators should be evaluated by more than one administrator and on other factors besides that administrators observations.

Educators who have and issues or areas that they are struggling in, should be trained and supported, not attacked or fired. Educators, like any other employee, who do not improve after proper training and support, can then be let go.

Some business practices can be used in Education. Lets use some of the employee evaluation tools from other areas in education. Education policies also need to be based on scientific research, data, best practices, and advice from professional educators. Politicians and the public are not educational experts. They need to listen to the experts.

Remember, our goal is always to improve the education of our students. Attacking teachers does not do that. If what we are doing does not help our students, we shouldn't be doing it.



What are your thoughts? 

Delegation is an essential tool for any leader. No one can do everything themselves, and no one is an expert on everything. Being able to delegate is what makes a leader effective. Here are some keys to successful delegation.

1. Know your staff
What skills does your staff have? Which staff members are not already overwhelmed with tasks? Who is the best person to handle this project? Is it something that requires more than one person? Staff members have outside interests and skills that can be useful. Take a survey of your staff at the beginning of the school year to find out their skills and talents that can be useful. For example, I am a paramedic with emergency planning and response experience and training so I am working on the emergency planning team. 

The Baldrige programs mission is to improve the competitiveness and performance of  US organizations. It is part of the The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), which is an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce. I've used some of this in my past career as an engineer. I think some of the criteria can be useful in education also.

Baldrige Critera

Customer Driven - in education, our "customers" are the students. We need to make sure that everything we do, and every decision we make is for the benefit of our students.

Visionary Leadership - we need educational leaders with values who can come up with new and innovative ways to address issues in education.

Organization and Personal Learning - Continuous improvement and education - everyone in education needs to be lifelong learners and continue to learn and improve themselves.

Valuing Employees and Partners - educational leaders need make sure that their staff are valued and supported. We also need to make sure we include our community partners.

Agility - rapid change and flexibility - education, like most government, is slow to change. We need to change when needed to better address the needs of our students.

Focus on Future - long term goals, focus, commitments - what is the long term goal of education? Think beyond the next test or next marking period. Start planning long term.

Managing for Innovation - educational leaders need to embrace change, and encourage faculty, students, and community partners to come up with innovative ideas to solve problems and issues.

Managment by Fact - measure, analyze, data - data driven decision making. Decisions have to be made based on research, data, best practices, and what will benefit our students.

Public Responsibility and Citizenship - civic duties - our duty is to our students, their families and the community.

Focus on Results and Creating Value - in education, this is not test scores. It is providing students with the skills and resources they need to be successful in life.

Systems Perspective - look at the big picture.

Meetings are something that all managers and leaders need to be able to plan, organize, run and follow up on. When I was a project engineer, I had to run lots of meetings and had training in effective meetings at a couple different companies. I've attended good meetings, and really bad meetings. In education, many meetings seem to be a complete waste of time, or the entire faculty is at a meeting that only affects a small number. Meetings are expensive - you have to take into consideration the time and salaries during the meeting and the fact that people aren't doing other work. Make your meetings effective - have a clear objective and keep them short and to the point. 

   

I am an Eagle Scout, member of the Order of the Arrow, and have been an assistant scoutmaster and merit badge counselor. I've learned a lot from Boy Scouts that I have been able to use in school, college, career, and life.

One of the training for leaders that the Boy Scouts do is called Woodbadge. I thoroughly enjoyed this training and learned things that helped me as an engineering manager and help me now as an educational leader. This is an excellent program that has even been used by corporations for managers. The basic ideas are good for any leader in any area, including education.

Here are the main topics from when I took the course:

- Knowing and using resources - Know the resources you have and use them to benefit your organization. Educational leaders should know what resources they have in their own staff.

Educational leaders, just like educators, can often feel overwhelmed with too many things to do. This can cause problems in the school because important tasks are not being completed. When the leader, for instance a principal, is overwhelmed, or tries to do too many things themselves, or tries to micromanage, the school can suffer. 


I am a paramedic and EMS officer and have over 22 years of EMS experience. One of the things every firefighter, paramedic/EMT, and police officer in the United States has to take is a basic incident command course. The basic course is available on FEMA's Independent Study Program and is a free, online course. Public Safety leaders (officers and the like) then take more intensive training including running drills. 


There is also an Incident Command course for Schools. IS-100.SCa Introduction to the Incident Command System for Schools is an excellent course that all school leaders should take in order to prepare themselves to handle emergencies in the school. 


Incident Command training is also an excellent way to learn more about leading a group and delegating authority. Incident Command includes some great aspects that can be used by any leader in almost any situation. Common terminology, task lists, standard job descriptions and responsibilities, support materials, and much more are all part of incident command and should be used in other areas also. Another concept is span-of-control. 

Span-of-control is a concept that says that a leader should only oversee 3 to 7 individuals, with 5 being optimal. This prevents the leader from being overwhelmed or being pulled in too many directions. It forces them to delegate authority to others. It is very important to maintain proper leadership, function, communication and efficiency. 


Principals and other school leaders should follow the span-of-control concept and have only 3 to 7 people reporting to them, with 5 as the optimal amount. Assistant principals, counselors, and teachers would be used as the "Section" leaders and then would have other people under them (committees). This would allow meetings to be smaller and more effective and work to flow better. The principal meets with their team, who then go and meet with their teams, and so on. 


With technology, it's easy to try to communicate and work with everyone all the time. But even with technology, people can only manage some much as one person. 




What do you think?