There's a lot of political lip-service of late given to ridding schools of bad teachers. But be aware if you're looking to do so in Dallas. A 30-year veteran teacher was fired due in part to low ratings on the "Classroom Effectiveness Index," a value-added evaluation instrument. All of this started back in August when a handful of teachers were let go at the veteran teacher's school. DISD spokesman John Dahlander explained,
If their TAKS rates are low, and they are not even reaching the levels that other teachers are reaching, then they may be recommended for termination. That falls into a small subset of teachers, but it does happen.
Apparently not, John. Seems there's a huge difference between recommending termination and said termination actually happening. The ??teacher petitioned the Texas Education Agency Commissioner to be reinstated and, low and behold, she's back (with back pay). The Commissioner found (a la Broader and Bolder) that the school environment and student discipline problems were to blame for the teacher's firing, not the teacher's performance. Ugh.
According to 2003-2004 NCES data, only 1.9 percent of our nation's public school teachers with more than 3 years of experience were dismissed or didn't have their contracts renewed due to poor performance. Is it any wonder?
