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By Andrea Eger Teachers and principals across Oklahoma will soon have to make the grade on a new five-point rating system or risk losing their jobs. Gov. Brad Henry recently signed into law Senate Bill 2033, or the Oklahoma Teacher and Leader Effectiveness Act, which calls for a new system of evaluating public school educators to be in place no later than December 2011. The Oklahoma Education Association supported the legislation, which was written to strengthen the state's chances in a federal education grant competition called Race to the Top. But local teachers union leaders say they didn't sign off on a letter of support for the state's latest Race to the Top application, in large part because of their concerns about the new statewide evaluation system. "We have been working with our district to try to get a better evaluation system. We would like a system that truly takes the subjectiveness out so that teachers understand what they need to do to get better, but the state will measure student growth. I can do as much as I can to help every kid, but that doesn't mean I can get every kid to grow," said Denzel Kesterson, president of the Tulsa Classroom Teachers Association. "I also don't know what that means. Is it growth over three years or just one year? Does it mean every child?" The act sets out certain criteria for the Oklahoma Teacher and Leader Effectiveness Evaluation System, which will be used to rate educators each year as superior, highly effective, effective, needs improvement or ineffective. Teachers, principals, assistant principals and any other school administrators who supervise classroom teachers will be rated and face remediation and possible dismissal for any rating below "effective" for two or three years in a row. The act calls for the formation of the Oklahoma Race to the Top Commission to help oversee and advise the state Board of Education in the development and implementation of the evaluation system. OEA President Becky Felts said she sees the system as a process that teachers will be able to use to improve their skills. "OEA strongly believes that every student should have an effective teacher and every teacher should have an effective administrator in their building," she said. "The voice of the teacher is going to be heard in this process and who knows better how to impact the growth of students than the public school teachers?" Felts said her organization will advocate for a system that holds educators accountable for student growth based not only on standardized tests, but also other measures of student growth over the course of a school year, such as teacher-made tests and student performance on educational projects. Another reform included in the legislation ties the standards for teachers to attaining "career" status, which is sometimes referred to as tenure, to their ratings in the new evaluation system. Felts said OEA likes the change because a teacher with a "superior" rating could obtain career status in three years - one year earlier than previously allowed in Oklahoma. The act also calls for the development of five model plans for incentive pay, although it allows districts who opt for incentive pay to develop their own plan with input from local parents, teachers, business leaders and other residents. House Speaker Chris Benge, R-Tulsa, was one of the authors of the legislation. "When it comes to the education of our state's children, we cannot let the status quo be good enough anymore," Benge said in a press statement. "Creativity and innovation in our classrooms needs to be encouraged and rewarded. This legislation will simply reward teachers for going above and beyond to help our children succeed." The Providence Journal (Rhode Island) |
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