Teachers: New evaluations a burden

By the end of May, Hawaii teachers should know how they fared under a new evaluation system that has administrators sitting in on classrooms and students filling out assessments of how well teachers are meeting their needs.

The Educator Effectiveness System — in full effect this year following a phase-in period over the past two years— links teacher pay and advancement to their performance, but some teachers worry the evaluations are subjective. Others don’t understand the multifaceted requirements and question the value of paperwork, conferences and reporting mandates they say overload their already busy schedules.

Kealakehe Elementary School teacher Diane Aoki said the requirements are so burdensome and futile they’ve prompted her to retire early.

“It’s not worth it, the energy, time and effort into something you don’t believe will make a difference,” said Aoki, who has been a teacher in Hawaii for 20 years.

“I’m going to take a penalty because I’m not old enough to take my full pension,” Aoki said.

The EES evaluates teachers based on two classroom observation sessions by administrators each year and a student survey that rates teachers, among other standards. Teachers are required to set learning goals and document how well students are progressing through the year. Nonclassroom teachers are also required to build a portfolio of evidence that they’re meeting teaching goals.

In their observations of teachers, principals are tasked with determining how well teachers are establishing a culture of learning, using questions and discussions, engaging students, managing their behavior and using assessments to bolster achievement. The teachers and administrators then hold conferences to discuss what was observed, then the teacher summarizes the experience on a form.

Starting in the 2015-16 school year, the evaluations will be linked to teacher pay, with raises going to those teachers who perform well and the possibility of termination going to teachers who score low on the evaluations. Administrators will let teachers know their effectiveness ratings by May 23, according to DOE timelines.

Preparing for the conferences, researching requirements and other new tasks amount to a nightmare of paperwork, some teachers claim.

“It’s horrible,” said Kealakehe seventh-grade teacher James Karkheck. “It’s a whole bunch of extra work that either comes out of classroom creativity or out of my sleep. We all feel it’s just another thousand pound thing we’re being asked to carry around.”

According to a survey sent to 14,300 teachers by Honolulu-based Ward Research Inc., just over one third of teachers indicated they had a high level of understanding of the classroom observation process, and only 12 percent professed a high level of understanding of how the student growth model works, according to 4,280 responses.

West Hawaii Complex Area Superintendent Art Souza said he would be the first to acknowledge the initiative has required “a tremendous amount of work,” not just by teachers but by administrators who have to conference with teachers and sit in on classes.

“It’s a lot of work, but anything worth doing is a lot of work at the beginning,” Souza said. “We have the foundation built and now we’re going to find a more fluid way to do this.”

Schools are already seeing better instruction in the classroom and much better cohesiveness between teachers and administrators, he said. How all of this impacts student performance will begin to be measured in the coming year, he said.

Souza said significant training has been done at the school level to familiarize teachers with the requirements, but more training and fine tuning needs to be done in the coming year.

The state launched the evaluation program as part of an effort to make teachers more accountable for student performance in return for $75 million in federal Race To The Top funds.

“It was unrealistic for the DOE to roll out so much, so fast, and expect it to be administered fairly and equitably,” said Maia Daugherty, president of the Kona chapter of the Hawaii State Teachers Association.

Overall, Hawaii teachers would like more time to understand the requirements and to complete the work that is called for, according to the Ward report.

Hawaii teachers were evaluated for years using the Professional Evaluation Program for Teachers, with 99 percent receiving satisfactory ratings, but the system did not quantify teacher contributions to student growth.

Big Island School Board member Brian De Lima said initial data shows 90 percent of Hawaii Island teachers are performing at levels rated as effective or highly effective under the new system. Additionally, completion rates for the conferences have also been high, he said.

“That is an affirmation of our teachers,” he said.

The DOE will continue to work with teachers and administrators to evaluate and improve the Teacher Evaluation System, he said.

“That’s what the collective bargaining process is all about,” he said.

On the Tripod Survey distributed to kindergarten, first- and second-grade students, students answer yes, no, or maybe/sometimes to questions such as the following samples provided by the DOE: I like the way my teacher treats me when I need help; My classmates behave the way the teacher wants them to; My teacher wants us to share our thoughts; I like the things that we are learning in this class.

Students fill out forms asking them to assess teachers on how well they control, challenge and captivate students, and also the student’s perception of how much the teacher cares about their well-being, among among other criteria.

Teachers are then asked to reflect on how they would use student responses to influence how they teach. The system is used in hundreds of schools in 25 states, according to the DOE.

But only 6 percent of teachers responding to the Ward survey thought students will put thought and effort into filling out the Tripod Survey.