Chicago schoolteachers go on strike

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by zimmy

Any idea what an accurate measure of teacher performance would be? Most teachers I know would be all in for raises based on performance, but it is very difficult to quantify performance. Standardized tests are not designed as a measure of teacher performance. It is kind of like measuring physicians based on the health of their patients. Some terrible physicians would look great and the best oncologists in the world could look terrible. The city schools can't keep teachers to begin with. A well meaning, but misguided system for judging performance won't help the kids or tax payers.

"Any idea what an accurate measure of teacher performance would be? "

That's a great question. In my opinion, evaluating teachers based solely on student improvement on test scores is unfair. What if the kid was up all night because his parents were fighting, and he bombs the test? That's not the teachers fault.

But obviously there's a way to differentiate the best teachers from the worst teachers. Hell, when I was 12 years old, I could tell you who was the best, and who was the worst.

It might be hard to distinguish between the 15th best teacher and the 16th best teacher, but it's not hard to identify the worst. The problem is, tenure makes it almost impossible to fire them. And very, very few teachers are willing to abandon the concept of tenure. They want their job guaranteed. And yuo cannot tell me that benefits the chikdren in any way, that only benefits the senior teachers.

"it is very difficult to quantify performance"

Agreed, I don't know that you can use a "statistic" to evaluate teachers. It should be based on evaluations by the principal, and feedback from parents, and even the students in some cases. The principals know which of their teachers are stellar, and which are dead weight.

"A well meaning, but misguided system for judging performance won't help the kids or tax payers"

Agreed 100%. If we reward teachers based on performance (and how could anyone be opposed to that), we need an accurate way of determining performance.

But evaluating teachers is not harder than evaluating anyone who works in any service type capacity. It's not all that hard. It may be hard to quantify as you said, but if you observe the teachers in their classrooms, you'll see clearly who is the best and who is the worst...

But to get to my original point, the teachers should not be striking over this. They serve the public, that's their sole purpose. I cannot imagine how disruptive this must be for the parents.

[scottw]

anecdotal teaching story...

my wife decided to go back to school and get another degree after our kids were born...she wanted to teach so she commuted part time an hour each way for several years to earn her degree...she graduated Summa Cum Laude with a stack of impressive recommendations from the schools that she student taught at and from her college instructors, she began applying to every opening within an hours commute and was unable to get interviews for permanent positions. She did daily subbing at various schools and had some long term sub jobs that produce more impressive letters of recommendation building her resume and continued to apply to openings but still not getting interviews for posted job interviews. After a couple of years of daily and long term subbing at various schools the end of summer was approaching and she was a little frustrated at the prospect of another school year spent subbing. She noticed an opening at a charter school and landed a job about a week before the beginning of the school year. It didn't pay a lot and the contracts were year to year but it was a job. She had a very succesful first year and was considered a model teacher, in her second year she was one of 4 teachers nominated for Teacher of the Year in the combined and enormous school district that her school is considered part of. There were two pretty attractive job openings posted this summer that she applied for, one happened to be a school system that she'd spent considerable time in during her student teaching and subbing days...she applied to both, never heard back from either except to read the reply notices that the jobs had been filled, in one case she had impressive letters of recommendation from both teachers and administrators within the schools system that she was applying to and could not get an interview. We would never suggest that she ought to get a job based on her resume because I'm sure the hiring is/was based on many factors, but you'd think she might have at least gotten an interview given her history. She had an experience at one particular school district where they put the long term sub applicants through a long interview process, she went though the process a couple of times for different openings because she really wanted to work and each time she came home upset and frustrated because she felt that the panel of interviewers were either rude or disinterested and that their decision was made well ahead of time, making the time that she invested to apply and drive to the interviews futile.

[zimmy]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

"Any idea what an accurate measure of teacher performance would be? "

That's a great question. In my opinion, evaluating teachers based solely on student improvement on test scores is unfair. What if the kid was up all night because his parents were fighting, and he bombs the test? That's not the teachers fault.

But obviously there's a way to differentiate the best teachers from the worst teachers. Hell, when I was 12 years old, I could tell you who was the best, and who was the worst.

It might be hard to distinguish between the 15th best teacher and the 16th best teacher, but it's not hard to identify the worst. The problem is, tenure makes it almost impossible to fire them. And very, very few teachers are willing to abandon the concept of tenure. They want their job guaranteed. And yuo cannot tell me that benefits the chikdren in any way, that only benefits the senior teachers.

"it is very difficult to quantify performance"

Agreed, I don't know that you can use a "statistic" to evaluate teachers. It should be based on evaluations by the principal, and feedback from parents, and even the students in some cases. The principals know which of their teachers are stellar, and which are dead weight.

"A well meaning, but misguided system for judging performance won't help the kids or tax payers"

Agreed 100%. If we reward teachers based on performance (and how could anyone be opposed to that), we need an accurate way of determining performance.

But evaluating teachers is not harder than evaluating anyone who works in any service type capacity. It's not all that hard. It may be hard to quantify as you said, but if you observe the teachers in their classrooms, you'll see clearly who is the best and who is the worst...

But to get to my original point, the teachers should not be striking over this. They serve the public, that's their sole purpose. I cannot imagine how disruptive this must be for the parents.

I believe I agree with everything Jim said in this post