Teacher Accountability Does Not Equal Evaluations Tied to Test Scores

First appeared as Teacher Accountability Does Not Equal Evaluations Tied to Test Scores in The Apple.


Here in New York State Governor Cuomo is making it his business to tie teacher evaluations to standardized test scores. The teacher’s union is fighting it, and well they should, because judging teachers on their students’ test scores is about as fair as judging Cuomo on the state’s economic condition. In both cases no one would get rehired, and that is because you are evaluating a person on things beyond his or her control.

As an educator, I welcome the drive for teacher accountability. Just like a doctor should be accountable for his patients, a teacher is responsible for the well-being of the whole child. Because of this, there should be a wide range of evaluative criteria used to give a teacher a formal review at the end of the year. What has the child accomplished in this classroom? Is there a portfolio of his or her work? How far has he or she come in speaking, listening, reading, and writing? What mathematics skills is he or she coming away with? And, perhaps most important of all, does the child leave that class more than ready for the next grade on a social as well as an academic level?

Assessments are fickle things. Over the years I have had parents come into my office upset about a child’s state test score. The child has always been an “A” student (this I know is true from his or her records). How could he or she have done so poorly on the state test? They are upset and don’t like the “stigma” of the child now needing “academic intervention” when he or she does so well otherwise, but the score makes it a requirement.

Why did this child do poorly on the state test? The answers are many. For one thing, a child can wake up and have a bad day. The child may not feel well; the instrument itself may be less than it should be; the day may have been too hot or cold, or maybe the child didn’t eat a full breakfast. The list can go on and on. One test given on one day is what it is: a measure of the child’s performance on that day. It should not be seen in the big picture as proof of the child’s total ability, and it certainly cannot be tied to a teacher’s evaluation with ramifications affecting employment.

As an educator I have had many students return to see me over the years. I have also run into former students on the subway, at a Mets game, on Jones Beach, or even in a movie theatre. When I see them smiling, feel them shaking my hand and talking about my class affectionately, I know they are not thinking about what they got on an assessment ten or fifteen years ago. They are thinking fondly about an experience that goes well beyond the minutiae of state testing results being used by school districts for promotional purposes.

When I look back over my own years as a student, I have fond memories of certain teachers. You probably do too. The ones who made a lasting impression on me did so because of their ability to connect with me on many different tangible and intangible levels. I have no idea what score I had on tests in those classes, but I remember the profundity of the impact they had on my life.

Even now I remember some of the things those teachers said (and have honestly used them myself in the classroom as a teacher). The impact of those words reverberate over time and space, affecting not just my life but the lives of my students and then, perhaps, the lives of many other students who may have some of my former students as teachers. The rock tossed into the pond comes to mind, and the ripples are memories that never fade. State assessments can also be compared to rocks, but ones thrown into the ocean – they sink to the bottom and are never thought about again.

Please let me say again that I believe in teacher accountability. This has to do with many things beyond preparing students for a state assessment every year. Teacher accountability has to do with knowing best practices (and using them); it entails intimate knowledge of the curriculum, state standards, and having the skills to deliver superior instruction. It also has to do with knowing that what happens in the classroom is not about the teacher but about the student and his or her success, but that success is fluid and should never be tied to one assessment given on one day, rather it should be based on a myriad of things that will gauge performance over an extended period.

Being a teacher is truly a calling, and the person who steps into a classroom must take on everything that came before him or her, all that is going on in the present, and needs to be aware of all things coming up ahead (like common core standards). Good teachers never stop learning and never stop doing, and I bet that the ones you remember most fondly probably never sat at a desk. You cannot teach from behind a desk any more than a doctor can operate from behind one.

The message here is simple: make teachers accountable for things they are responsible for doing, but do not place the heft of unreasonable expectations tied to test scores on their shoulders. Evaluations of teachers should include many elements besides state assessment scores, and there should be a direct correlation between the students’ total accomplishments for the year and teacher ratings.

Using test scores is an obvious and poor attempt by New York State to try to rattle the union, get rid of teachers with higher salaries, and shape schools to resemble a corporate mentality that has no business being in education. Teachers are standing up for their rights here in New York, and it is time for the public to have awareness of the reality of what is happening.

I doubt that we will reach a time when former students go to a reunion and talk about their test scores instead of the great teachers they had; however, if that ever happens, then the governor’s push that is brewing now will have done more than just ruin the lives of many hard working teachers, it will be a travesty that changes the face of education in New York State in a nefarious and disastrous way forevermore.