State should rush implementation of new teachers evaluation system
Education Action Group would like to congratulate Mitchell Chester, the Massachusetts commissioner of elementary and secondary education, for his bold plan to hold teachers more accountable for student performance, partially through the use of test scores.
We also applaud the leadership of the Massachusetts Teachers Association for accepting student test scores as an accurate measure of teacher effectiveness. It’s refreshing to hear union voices finally acknowledge the importance of sorting out good teachers from bad ones, and giving less successful teachers a short-term path to improvement or job termination.
For too long public schools across the nation have been forced to accept the presence of subpar teachers due to tenure laws, seniority provisions and the lack of effective evaluation systems. Teachers have a critical job to perform, and they are not all equal in their skills. Public schools need the power to determine who is getting the job done, who isn’t, and make necessary adjustments.
We were disappointed to learn that Massachusetts school districts might have two or three years to implement the new teachers evaluation system, assuming it gains approval from the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.
That would probably involve lengthy negotiations with local unions over implementation of the system in individual districts. That means local unions will have the ability to water down the new system to the point where it’s largely meaningless.
According to one report, some local unions do not share the MTA’s enthusiasm for the plan, and can be counted on to sabotage the effort at the local level.
Meanwhile, current students have the right to have the best teachers in their classrooms as soon as possible. If the implementation process takes three years, many will be shortchanged.
We hope the architects of the new evaluation system are diligent in their efforts to force schools to implement the plan in its original form, in the shortest possible time frame. The students of Massachusetts deserve no less.
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