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Valley principals review state’s new plan for evaluating teachers
By Denise Dick
Canfield
Beginning in July 2013, all Ohio teachers will be evaluated using a new system.
School principals in Mahoning and Columbiana counties spent three days this week learning about the system at Mahoning Career and Technical Center and at the Youngstown Board of Education office.
Representatives from the Mahoning County Educational Service Center led the presentation.
The new evaluation allots 50 percent of the evaluation to teacher performance on standards and 50 percent on student-growth measures.
Teachers will be determined to be either at above expected growth, at expected growth or below expected growth based on formal observation, classroom walk-throughs and other information.
Each evaluation will consist of two formal observations of the teacher at least 30 minutes each as well as periodic classroom walkthroughs.
Those in the first two categories will be given a professional growth plan while those at below expected growth will be on an improvement plan.
“If a teacher is at above expected growth, they get a professional growth plan, and it is self-directed,” said Kathy Harper, director of equity and talent at the Ohio Department of Education.
Those teachers also may choose who evaluates them.
The principals heard Harper’s presentation via video conference.
Under student growth, local districts have some leeway in determining how different factors are weighted within that 50 percent, said Barbara Williams, director of curriculum and instruction at the county ESC.
If a district has value- added data, which gauges student progress from one year to the next, it must be part of the evaluation. A district may decide the percentage it’s given in the evaluation.
Similarly, if a district has vendor assessment data for a teacher, it must be used, but the district can determine the percentage. Vendor assessment data is evaluation done by a vendor that is ODE approved.
Local measures, such as short-cycle assessments, comprise the remainder of the 50 percent student growth evaluation, Williams said.
The student-growth measures and teacher performance on standards will be combined to reach a rating of accomplished, proficient, developing or ineffective.
Williams said that a proficient rating means a teacher is above expected growth. Proficient on student evaluations indicates he or she is just meeting minimum standards, but on the teacher evaluation system it indicates a very good teacher, she said.