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House bills 5223 and 5224, which aim to change the standards by which teachers are evaluated, were read in in the House of Representatives on Jan. 22. These could change goals for teachers beginning as early as next year, but there is still much dispute about whether these changes will be for the best.
These bills would set up a new system for teacher and administrator evaluation in Michigan. Under the proposed legislation, student growth will comprise at least 25 percent of a teacher’s evaluation for the first three years and would increase to at least 50 percent beginning in 2017. The rest of the evaluation will be based on teacher practice, namely the results of observations.
Additionally, the bills will require schools to set up a mentor system in which teachers with high evaluations are partnered with teachers who are deemed less effective. While some schools already use a mentor system, the bills propose making it a requirement.
Dexter Education Association President Joseph Romeo, a computer teacher at Dexter High School, said he supports this aspect of the bill.
“Mentors are absolutely critical,” he said.
While the intent of the bill is to provide a concrete measurement for how effective individual teachers are in communicating the material, the fear among many educators is that the emphasis on student growth will shift focus from benefiting the students to simply producing test scores and grades.
“All of our jobs are to prepare (students) for college,” Principal William Moran said. “I’m disappointed that we’re going to create a situation where teachers aren’t trying to do the best teaching. I want my teachers to focus on teaching the kids that show up every day to the best of their ability.”
Part of the problem, Romeo said, is that all students do not come from similar situations outside of school. The differences in students’ ability to focus on education outside of school will be reflected in their test scores and, in the new system, in their teachers’ evaluations.
“I would say to understand whether schools are adequately doing their job, we must address (other) issues,” Romeo said. “You would expect … students from higher socioeconomic communities to outperform students from lower socioeconomic communities.”
In order to ease such fears, legislators went to the Michigan Council on Educator Effectiveness for recommendations on which to base their bill. This way, educators would be involved in forming the education bills. Much of the bills are based on these suggestions, but more weight was given to student growth in the bills than was advised by council.
“The (MCEE) recommendation was excellent,” Moran said, despite his qualms about the bills themselves.
According to Moran, the effects of the bills changes in teacher evaluations would primarily be seen when deciding which teachers will be laid off in times of financial strain. Therefore, the changes would be less evident in districts such as Dexter, where mass layoffs have not yet been a problem.
As these bills are only the most recent in a string of proposed changes to the Michigan educational system, teachers cannot yet be sure what changes will come in the near future. Moran is not confident, however, that the legal system will produce an ideal system for teachers and students.
He said, “I wish I was more optimistic.”
