Teachers are scared. In fact, some are terrified. Many are
working harder than ever on their exit strategies, planning to flee the
profession as quickly as possible. Why is this?
What I hear when I encounter teachers around the country at
conferences and workshops, while on Twitter and while reading blogs is that
teachers are horrified that they will be forced to become slaves to the new
test-based evaluation system that is becoming commonplace in public schools.
If you have read any of my work, you know that I am a
results-only teacher, meaning I work in a place where students are guided by
inquiry, collaboration and 21st-century web-based instruction. There
is messiness to this place that makes learning fun, while abandoning the order
that the bureaucrats, testing lobbyists and authors of the Common Core so
desire.
How would you fare?
Not long ago, a college professor, who had read my book, asked
me how I would fare under the complex scoring model, upon which the new
evaluation system is built.
“I probably wouldn’t do well,” I admitted. This isn’t
because my students don’t pass high stakes tests; in fact, they pass at
considerably higher rates than their peers in traditional classrooms. “There is
a two-fold problem with scoring well on this evaluation, while working in a
student-centered classroom,” I explained.
First, teachers are now being judged on the Value Added
scale, a convoluted statistic that attempts to measure growth over the course
of a single school year. Value Added, though, has more holes than all
California golf courses combined, not the least of which being the fact that
its creators refuse to share its formula with teachers.
The other problem with the new evaluation system is that it
attempts to turn teachers into automatons. Those who score only at the average
level must have their students recite standards like some bizarre choir. To be
just average a teacher must run standards-based, rote-memory lesson plans,
while students play puppet to the teacher’s puppeteer. There’s not much
independent learning possible with teachers who run their classes strictly by
the new evaluation playbook.
The system won't work in a ROLE
There is no room for this kind of teaching in a results-only
classroom, where learning outcomes aren’t delivered like the daily mail.
Students have to think, collaborate and choose from a wide array of tools
provided by the teacher, who takes on more of a coaching role. Some movements
and activities may appear chaotic to an evaluator, using a canned rubric to
judge learning. Thus, the teacher in this class will likely suffer on the
evaluation.
Will all students in this environment reach their Value
Added number (sounds a lot like a prison uniform to me)? Perhaps not, but they
will all become independent learners, while their teacher may be tagged as
incompetent.
“So, what would you do, if you had to face this evaluation
system?” the college professor asked.
After a moment of contemplation, I responded. “I might score
poorly,” I said, “but I would never change how I teach, because my students
would suffer, and teachers have a responsibility to the kids, not to the
system.”
Now, you’re faced with the same question. When the new evaluation
system hits your school, what will you do?
Will you play the game, or will you help your students?
Sadly, you probably can’t do both.
Don't miss
Mark's book ROLE Reversal: Achieving Uncommonly Excellent Results in the Student-Centered Classroom, now available in the
ASCD store,
Barnes & Noble and at
Amazon.com
