Both politicians and educators enter their fields to make the world a better place.  I have no real evidence of this, but I am going to assume that it is true.  As a teacher, I know that I became a teacher so I could teach kids.  I like kids, I like being around them, and I like the idea of providing the best possible education to them.   I assume politicians enter politics because they like the community and want to serve it and feel they can do it well.

And how do we know we are doing well?  Politicians know they are doing well when they get reelected.  The populous decides they like the job they have been doing and elect them to another term.  They may also get to see real changes made to the community that they felt strongly about – a preserved hillside,  a new, thriving business district, a change in policy.   Change they helped make happen can give them the reassurance they are doing their job well. 

Evaluating teacher success has become a hot-button issue.  The current “Race to the Top” has tied federal funding of education reform dollars to using student achievement for assessment of teacher evaluation.   There is an emphasis on high stakes testing and using those results to evaluate how well a teacher or school is serving the community.   Because of the impossible nature of the task, I am opposed to using student achievement on standardized assessments for teacher evaluation.  (for more information, see the highly accessible, informative video here)

So how do I know if I am doing my job well?   It is true that part of how I know I am doing my job well is that students learn things.  We talk about stuff and then I ask them to prove that they know it, and they do.   For example, we spend weeks talking about one aspect of American history. Right now we are talking about explorers.   We have spent three weeks just going over different explorers and different reasons people went out and ended up in the ‘New World’.  Today, I asked them to give me an adjective to describe “explorers” for a sentence building activity we were going to do.  Not only did they give me lots of adjectives, many of them came directly from what they have learned about explorers over the last few weeks.  They came up with words as varied as “adventurous”, “murderous” and “Italian”.  This is not the only assessment I will do to determine if they have retained what the state standards require, but this was a good ‘check’.    None of this would show on a standardized test – the state does not test history until middle school. 

The attitude of the students will also tell me about how well I am doing my job.    Students, like all of us, prefer order.  They want predictable expectations and a sense or order in the classroom.   They don’t like it when the class is out of control – they don’t feel safe, and if they don’t feel safe, they cannot learn.  I am constantly asking my students to reflect on an activity or experience.   I, as the teacher, am in control of the classroom environment.  If my students are uncomfortable, feel threatened,  are argumentative or disrespectful, I know I am not doing my job well.   Likewise, if they are happy, even if they don’t really want to do something required (testing, for instance), I know I am doing my job well.    There is no standardized, bubble-in test that can measure this happiness and feeling of well-being.

I am constantly informing my teaching.  I talk to other professionals, read and reflect on teaching as a practice.  I am always striving to improve what I do.  I take classes, learn new things, read both education writing and content-related writing.  I read children’s literature, looking for new books to share with my class.  Constantly reflecting on what I do, and trying to push myself to be better is another way I know I am doing my job well. 

I know there are areas in which I need to improve.  I need to be more organized, I need to pay more attention to my English Language Learners.  I really need to spend more time with the Everyday Math curriculum. 

None of this, not the good nor the bad, shows up in standardized testing.   Politicians want the measure – they want to look at test data and decide who is doing a good job.  How can test data tell them this?  

I am all for removing ineffective teachers from the classroom.   I am not sure how this can be done equitably, but I am pretty sure that you can’t connect it to test scores.   Student achievement is not entirely in the hands of the teacher.  It is in the hands of the whole community.  Are the children healthy?  Do they have a good diet?  Are they getting enough rest?  Do they have stress at home?   Do they have plenty of outside time?   If you want to use standardized test scores to evaluate something, use it to evaluate the health of the community as a whole, not just one part of it.

Who, then is responsible for the community?  Why, we the people of the community are responsible.  And in our society, how to we ensure the community we live in is well taken care of?  We elect officials – politicians- to office to take care of the community.  So – if we are going to use standardized test scores to evaluate how someone is doing their job, it should be the politicians. 

Now, I honestly don’t think you should use test scores to evaluate any one’s performance, other than the performance of a student on a particular assessment.  I am in full agreement that our education system is broken.  I am in complete agreement that changes need to be made.  I am working in the broken system, trying to do the best that I can with what little I have been give, with the great needs of the students in my class, and trying to get them as far as they can go.   I need help, I need support.  I am doing my job well, even if the test scores don’t show it.