A Letter from Stand for Children:
Earlier this year, our voting membership decided that Stand for Children should support policies that provide meaningful, fair, consistent evaluations for teachers and principals with appropriate training for evaluators and professional development/support for teachers to ensure ongoing improvement.
Yesterday, the House Education Committee passed the following amendment to SB1040, a bill that takes a small but important step toward reaching our ultimate goal of providing teachers and principals with the tools they need to do their best work, and ensuring that every Arizona child has an excellent teacher and principal every year:
“On or before December 15, 2011, the State Board of Education shall establish and maintain a model framework for a teacher and principal evaluation instrument that uses quantitative data on student academic progress for fifty percent of the evaluation outcomes. School districts and charter schools shall use this instrument to annually evaluate individual teachers and principals beginning in school year 2012-13.”
Basically, this means that teachers and principals will be evaluated using data on how much students are learning and growing each year, as well as qualitative measures that get at the parts of educating a child you just can’t get at with testing alone.
In addition to being a positive step forward for students and teachers, this legislation puts assurances made in Arizona’s Race to the Top application into statute and if Arizona reapplies for federal Race to the Top dollars, could strengthen the state’s application.
Some important facts about what the bill will do if passed:
•The bill allows twenty months for the State Board of Education to formulate a framework that allows for stakeholder groups to work together to design the best evaluation system? for Arizona. The next step for Stand for Children is to work closely with the state board and stakeholder groups to ensure the framework developed is rigorous, fair to teachers and principals and grounded in best practices and research. We look forward to hearing from you on all three of these points.
• The State Board of Education will be adopting a framework that provides districts with the necessary flexibility to implement successfully, not a rigid “one size fits all” instrument forced upon districts.
• This legislation includes teachers and principals; traditional public schools and public charter schools assuring that all stakeholders are at the table to ensure the best results for Arizona’s schoolchildren.
This important legislation is just one of a broader range of reforms that Stand for Children members voted to support. We will continue to advocate for meaningful induction and mentoring for teachers, and professional development tied to the evaluation process that all teachers and principals need to succeed. We will also continue to advocate for adequate funding of our public education system through our work on Proposition 100 and our work at the legislature.
To learn more about why teacher and principal effectiveness is such a hot topic these days, visit our Website.
In addition to moving this important bill forward, Stand for Children members are working hard to pass Proposition 100, and we need your help. As many of you know there is $555 million at stake for Arizona public schools. Click here to see what the impact will be on your individual school district and click here to take action by volunteering to help pass this important revenue preserving measure.
Questions? Thoughts? Contact us today.
Standing with you for Arizona children,
Megan Irwin
Jeff Winkler
Acting Arizona Director
Advocacy Director
645 North 4th Ave | Suite A | Phoenix, AZ 85003 | Email AZinfo@stand.org
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