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ERIC Number: ED502120
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 2008-Jan-29
Pages: 34
Abstractor: ERIC
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Rush to Judgment: Teacher Evaluation in Public Education. Education Sector Reports
Toch, Thomas; Rothman, Robert
Education Sector
The state of teacher evaluation is a significantly and frequently neglected problem in public education, an enterprise that spends $400 billion annually on salaries and benefits. Because teacher evaluation is at the center of the quality of teaching in the nation's classrooms, it has the potential to be a powerful lever of teacher and school improvement. The authors posit that many factors, including a lack of accountability for school performance, staffing practices that strip school systems of incentives to take teacher evaluation seriously, union ambivalence, and the practice of using teacher credentials as a proxy for teacher quality, have resulted in teacher evaluation systems throughout public education that are superficial, capricious, and frequently do not directly address the quality of instruction. The authors examine the causes and consequences of the status of teacher evaluation and its implications for the current national debate about performance pay for teachers. The report also examines a number of national, state, and local evaluation systems that offer potential alternatives to current practice. Descriptions of Standards-Based Teacher Evaluation Models are appended. (Contains 37 endnotes and 2 figures.)
Education Sector. 1201 Connecticut Avenue NW Suite 850, Washington, DC 20036. Tel: 202-552-2840; Fax: 202-775-5877; Web site: http://www.educationsector.org
Publication Type: Opinion Papers; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: Elementary Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: KnowledgeWorks Foundation; William T. Grant Foundation
Authoring Institution: Education Sector
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
IES Cited: ED565633; ED565674; ED552484