Title:
How Much Should a Teacher's Job Depend on Test
Scores?
Description: This is
a VOA Special English Education Report.
See text below
Text:
Students in Washington, DC, returned to classrooms
in August to begin a new school year. But at least
five percent of their teachers did not return with
them. In July, the District of Columbia public
schools told two hundred six teachers that they were
not good enough to stay. The school system in the
nation's capital dismissed seventy-five teachers in
twenty-ten. It was the first year of a new teacher
rating system. Experts say such large numbers of
dismissals are rare in American schools. But in
Washington the rating system is not governed by the
labor contract with the teachers union. So school
officials have more freedom. The system is called
IMPACT. Teachers are observed in the classroom five
times a year for at least thirty minutes each time.
They are also judged by student test scores.
Administrators rated sixty-five of the two hundred
six teachers as "ineffective." The others lost their
jobs because they were rated "minimally effective"
for a second year.Emily Cohen at the National
Council on Teacher Quality, a private research
group, praises the IMPACT system. "This is an
evaluation instrument that is finally able to
capture who is highly effective and who is
ineffective and who could be doing better and could
use some assistance. Most evaluation instruments in
the country do not capture teacher performance --
all teachers are rated satisfactory." Some
Washington teachers say their ratings depend too
heavily on test scores. For some teachers, half of
their rating is based on how well their students do.
But Emily Cohen says testing is probably "the most
objective data that we have on teacher performance."
The District is also looking at other things, she
says, "so it's not just looking at student test
performance." Teachers with the highest rating can
receive a bonus of up to twenty-five thousand
dollars. In addition, they can receive a pay
increase. Almost sixty percent of the teachers who
were rated "minimally effective" in twenty-ten
stayed in the school system and improved. School
officials say these teachers received help to become
better.The Washington Teachers Union says IMPACT
unfairly hurts teachers who work in schools with
high rates of poverty. The Washington Post reported
that most of the teachers with the highest rating
work in schools with lower poverty rates. For VOA
Special English, I'm Carolyn Presutti. For more
education news and to learn American English, go to
voaspecialenglish.com.
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Hi. I
personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
