Mary Johnson Photo
Branford school officials are pleased the district will have a chance to use its new teacher evaluation system to help formulate the way teachers statewide will be evaluated under the Connecticut’s new educational reforms.
Branford was one of 10 districts and consortiums chosen by the state this week to conduct pilot programs of teacher evaluations during the 2012 – 2013 school year. Most districts will be using a system proposed by the State Department of Education. A few, including Branford, will be able to use their own parameters.
The inclusion in the state project is doubly beneficial since Branford had already planned to conduct a pilot of its new system during the coming year. Click here to read a story about Branford’s new evaluation system which will be based on multiple mini-observations, student performance, and surveys of parents and students.
“It’s very exciting,” Superintendent Hamlet Hernandez told the Eagle. “We’ve done a lot of work (on our new system) but we wanted to avail ourselves of the state’s resources.”
Branford’s assistant superintendent, Dr. Mary Peraro, and a 17-member team having been working for two years to devise the new evaluation format. “The state wanted to pick some of the pilot schools that will do their own plan,” Peraro told the Eagle. “They wanted to offer options to the whole state.”
The districts conducting the pilots represent a mix of socio-economic factors, including size, academic performance, and ethnic diversity. Hernandez said the state was also looking at which districts were already revising their evaluations.
“The state’s aim was to get a cross-representation,” Hernandez said. “Some districts were further along (in developing evaluations) and we’re one of them.”
The selection of pilot districts was announced earlier this week by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, and State Department of Education Commissioner Stefan Pryor.
“The selection of these pilot districts is another step forward in our effort to fix what’s broken in our public schools,” Malloy said in a press release. “The fact is that many of our state’s schools and most of our teachers are doing a tremendous job in preparing our students for the challenges they will face as adults. But without a fair and reliable evaluation system, teachers and administrators are left with no clear indicators of where they are succeeding and where they should improve.”
A state panel is still working to develop basic guidelines for evaluating teacher performance that must be approved by the State Board of Education by July 1.
Malloy’s initial plan to tie teacher evaluations to tenure and salary by July 2013 met with widespread disapproval. A compromise plan called for the one year pilot programs to help formulate an evaluation system.
The University of Connecticut’s Neag School of Education will analyze results of the pilot programs. Mandatory evaluation of teacher performance based on the new criteria will be implemented in the 2013 – 2014 school year.
Frank Carrano, chair of the Board of Education, told the Eagle that the alliance with the State Department of Education pilot project will be valuable. “This is what we were hoping for. We were going to pilot our program anyway. This will provide a little more support for us since there will be conversations with people from the state.”
A total of 36 districts and combinations of districts applied to be part of the pilot programs. In addition to Branford, the other districts chosen were: a consortium of Bethany, Orange, and Woodbridge; Bridgeport; Capitol Region Education; a consortium of Columbia, Eastford, Franklin, and Sterling; Litchfield and Region 6; Norwalk; Waterford, Windham and Windsor.
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Parents and students opinions or thoughts have no place in a teachers evaluation--they have no professional experience and have no idea what to look for---
Now a parent and students opinions and thoughts should be shared with the teacher confidentially so the teacher may choose to use this info--but NEVER NEVER in a summative evaluation-- for there is no validity in the info and would spoil the whole process--
and although ten minute drive by's can be used---in a real evaluation of a teacher--the evaluator needs to be there from start to finish---or the evaluator cant make a summative judgement----
So if this is what Branford proposes --they have gotten off on the wrong foot for sure---this process seems worthless and dubious at best---I hope you educators reject this simple system and ask for a professional review of your work-----
Good luck -- Tom