How Do You Evaluate Teachers
Who Change Lives?
I read the title of this article and was drawn in immediately. I have often wondered how some teachers will fare with the new evaluation system. So many things good teachers do can't be measured by numbers.
The author of this article was a troubled high school student that was fortunate enough to come across a teacher who really made a difference in her life during her 9th grade year. As she tells her story, this teacher didn't always do things the conventional way and may not have been highly in favor with administration. He dared to be controversial and do what he knew in his gut was right. This 9th grader is now a 35-year veteran of the public school system and currently a school superintendant. She remains in contact with this teacher who made such a difference for her. But she wonders if he might have been fired if evaluated by today's system.
This author writes that her greatest worry is "that teachers will fade into deadly, robotic, fit-the-rubric nonentities and receive high scores, but offer nothing of substance to students - nothing to carry with them for a lifetime."
We all need to think about the true goals of education. Aren't we meant to do more than teach reading and math? Shouldn't we be having a positive impact on students in other ways that can affect their lives for the better? I hope you can take a few minutes to read this article. I found it inspiring and think you will too.
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