Public school students are graded and tested all the time. Not so with teachers. Teachers have long been evaluated based on brief, pre-announced visits by principals who offer a confidential and subjective assessment of their skills. How much students are learning is rarely taken into account…
The surest sign of a teacher’s effectiveness is engagement.
Highly effective teachers routinely propel students from below grade level to advanced in a single year.
The best teachers were not concentrated in schools in the most affluent neighborhoods, nor were the weakest instructors bunched in poor areas.
Although many parents fixate on picking the right school for their child, it matters far more which teacher the child gets.
Teachers paid more for experience, education and training, had little bearing on whether they improved their students’ performance.