Are principals the best people to do teacher evaluations?
Not necessarily, a study published in this month鈥檚 Educational Policy journal suggests.
The study found that peer-led evaluations left teachers with more positive feelings and more motivated to make job-related changes compared to evaluations conducted by principals and other administrators.
But it wasn鈥檛 just that teacher-led evaluations left teachers feeling better; those done by principals left teachers objectively feeling worse and less likely to make adjustments.
鈥淚t wasn鈥檛 a neutral kind of thing,鈥� said Timothy G. Ford, an associate professor at the University of Oklahoma. Ford co-authored the paper, 鈥� with Alyson L. Lavigne, an associate professor at Utah State University.
鈥淎 lot of the times鈥eachers were coming away鈥�鈥攚ith worse feelings around their competence and their motivation toward teacher evaluations and teaching, and then they were making fewer changes to their practice. They are not really changing what they did after those encounters.鈥�
On top of that, Ford and Lavigne found that the kind of carrot-and-stick measures built into many American administrator-led teacher-evaluation systems鈥攕uch as salary increases for a job well done, or, on the other end, the possibility of punishment or termination鈥攁lso did not motivate teachers.
Their study is based on an analysis of responses to questionnaires on teachers鈥� perceptions of their evaluations and whether the feedback led to positive changes in their confidence, motivation, satisfaction, practice, and use of student assessments. The survey also asked principals how often they used measures such as bonuses and job changes as part of their evaluations.
鈥淭his goes back to basic psychological research, and that these sort of strategies are very harmful for long-term motivation of individuals,鈥� Ford said. 鈥淚f the goal is to create a sort of self-propelling practice鈥攖his idea of we want this practice to continue, we want it to be helpful and useful鈥攖hen using external rewards or punishment systems, we continue to see that these are harmful practices to have.鈥�
To be clear, Ford added, 鈥渘ot every application of external rewards or punishment鈥� was bad. Rather, it鈥檚 鈥渉ow it鈥檚 done and in what context that creates the challenges.鈥�
Is it better for principals or teachers to do evaluations?
Even though the peer-led evaluations led to more positive feelings and motivation, it鈥檚 hard to conclude from their research whether it鈥檚 better for principals or teachers to do evaluations, Ford said.
It鈥檚 possible that some evaluative tasks, such as classroom observations or feedback sessions with teachers, would be more appropriate for principals, depending on the school culture, while others may be better suited for teachers, he said. Veteran teachers, for example, may have more content knowledge expertise to help younger teachers improve. How the evaluation is framed and how teachers feel about it matter, too, he said.
It鈥檚 also not really about whether principals were doing a good or bad job evaluating teachers, but whether they were the best people in the school to do it.
鈥淭here is an assumption that because they are the authority figure that they need to do it,鈥� Ford said. 鈥淚t goes back to the idea of what is the purpose of the evaluation. If the purpose is to make teachers better, then I think, maybe, the principal is not the right person, necessarily, to do that. We have enough valuable resources in each of our schools in the form of experienced teachers, who鈥檝e been there and have done that.鈥�
Most teachers do not object to being evaluated; they really object, a lot of times, to the way it鈥檚 done and how they feel at the end of it.
While those teachers may still need training on how to provide meaningful feedback to their peers, for example, 鈥渢hey understand what it鈥檚 like to be a teacher and receive feedback, and they can be trained in ways [to do so],鈥� Ford said.
鈥淚f as a leader, you鈥檝e cultivated a culture of support around feedback and evaluations, maybe not even calling it evaluations, but simply providing feedback and receiving feedback, then I think principals can play that role. That鈥檚 maybe the role: It鈥檚 more of a facilitator of the evaluation that happens in school than the person who does it.鈥�
The most challenging part of evaluations is not the amount of paperwork or the time it takes to complete. It鈥檚 the quality of the feedback, he said.
Schools with a culture of improvement and trust and that embrace feedback and mentorship may be more conducive to peer-led evaluations.
鈥淪o much of giving good feedback and having it used depends on the context and the space that鈥檚 created around it,鈥� Ford said. 鈥淚 think a good leader is going to look at a peer-led system and say鈥� 鈥業s this really appropriate right now? Are we equipped to do it in this way?鈥� That鈥檚 the role of the leader in this.鈥�
But another thing to consider is the ultimate goal of evaluations. Models that center teacher growth and development may be more effective and should be prioritized over those steeped in high-stakes accountability.
鈥淭hose two purposes of evaluations鈥攖he summative and the evaluative鈥攐ften can be at odds with each other, but they don鈥檛 have to be.鈥�
Leveraging teacher expertise
The furor over teacher evaluations, which peaked during the Obama administration鈥檚 Race to the Top competitive grant program, has died down. The grant prompted many states to implement complicated teacher-evaluation systems, many of which heavily weighted students鈥� test scores and included performance-pay incentives as well as the threat of dismissal. They transformed principals鈥� jobs seemingly overnight, requiring them to spend a lot more time in classrooms and filling out complicated and time-consuming rubrics on teacher competency.
Changes in federal policy since then have given states more flexibility on how to evaluate teachers. But many of those Obama-era policies still remain in place, Ford noted.
The analysis uses data from the 2013 TALIS [Teaching and Learning International Survey] collected from lower secondary schools (the equivalent of middle schools) in the United States and in other countries that use both administrator-led and peer-led evaluation systems. The survey asked teachers and principals in countries that are part of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development about school conditions.
Ford and Lavigne analyzed data from 36,411 teachers from 2,759 schools in 11 countries. The data were collected at the time states were implementing the Race to the Top-era teacher-evaluation systems.
The researchers found that in the major areas where teachers were assessed鈥攐bservation of their teaching practice, content knowledge, and analysis of student test scores鈥攅valuations led by teachers resulted in more positive feelings of motivation, satisfaction, and changes to practice than administrator-led ones.
The study has some limitations. One is that the data are nearly a decade old at this point, and may not capture changes that have taken place since.
Another is that the researchers do not have additional insight into what the schools meant when they said 鈥渢eacher-led鈥� or 鈥渁dministrator-led.鈥� For example: What exactly were teachers or principals doing during observations, feedback sessions, or content discussions, and did some schools have more expert teachers than others?
And the data were collected at the middle school level, where subject-area expertise may be more important than in elementary schools, according to the paper.
The paper recommends piloting randomized experiments of teacher-led evaluation programs to get comparison data on the effectiveness of both teacher-led and more traditional, administrator-driven evaluations.
But more important, Ford said, would be including teachers in developing these systems, a recommendation he said that鈥檚 not going to be popular.
鈥淭here is a sense that if you give somebody control over a system that鈥檚 designed to evaluate them, they鈥檙e going to exploit it, or they are going to take advantage of it,鈥� he said.
鈥淢y recommendation would be bring teachers more into the conversation, see how they鈥檇 like to be evaluated, what they want to do,鈥� he added. 鈥淢ost teachers do not object to being evaluated; they really object, a lot of times, to the way it鈥檚 done and how they feel at the end of it.鈥�
