The NY Times and Daily News have great pieces on the folly of rating teachers by student test scores. They are written by teachers. Julie Cavanagh is a teacher who received a highly effective teacher data report but she showed how rating teachers based on growth in student test scores is ridiculous because of a number of factors. She calls for lower class sizes. Julie is someone who I know well from being a fellow honoree at Leonie Haimson's Skinny Awards last year. Julie is also one of the stars of the GEM movie "The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman.
The Times published an opinion column the other day, critical of the new evaluation system, written by fellow chapter leader Arthur Goldstein and today there is an excellent piece penned by teacher Willam Johnson called Confessions of a Bad Teacher. Johnson takes on the current unsatisfactory rating system and argues that teachers become poorer instructors when administration is on their backs. I couldn't agree more. He calls for equitable funding and claims we cannot even talk about basing our evaluations on student achievement until we distribute education money fairly.
These are three opinion articles well worth reading. I'm almost surprised they were published considering the anti-teacher climate that has taken over the political discourse these days. Enjoy them everyone.
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