educator effectiveness | Pathways to Achievement

Changing the culture of our work

Posted on February 22, 2013 by ceawhatworks

Principal Vanessa Fisher and teacher Brianne Dilley are working together at Sunnyside Elementary School in Durango to define their roles and responsibilities to improve teaching and student learning in Colorado’s new educator effectiveness evaluation system.

Vanessa Fisher & Brianne Dilley

“Already, with Vanessa coming in and observing, I’ve gotten some great feedback and new lessons I’ve tried because of her feedback,” said Dilley, a first grade teacher and Durango Education Association member in one of the evaluation system’s pilot districts, Durango 9-R.

“That’s making me a better teacher,” added Dilley. “That is the goal, to improve our practice and our lessons to make them better and more engaging for those kids.”

The team from Sunnyside Elementary joined close to 400 hundred educators from Durango and regional communities at Fort Lewis College in January for a district training conference on teaching strategies called “Theory into Practice”, led by the Colorado Education Association. Teachers and administrators spent the day together in professional development examining instruction, standards, assessments, and evaluations that will be used to measure student learning and teaching effectiveness.

“Today is about putting all the pieces together to help our staff really connect and understand all of the initiatives and all of the state requirements that are going on right now,” said Fisher. “We have to have a shared vision so we can move forward together.”

Linda Barker

“We’re changing the culture of our work,” said Linda Barker, CEA’s director of teaching and learning, in her opening remarks at the conference. “All of us are blurring the lines of what our roles are and how we work together. To me, that’s exciting.”

As one of the state’s leading trainers on Colorado’s educator effectiveness law, Barker told the audience the day was ‘monumental’ for an entire district to come together and talk about the teaching practices that make a difference for students.

“When you go back to your classroom, you’ll have new questions, new thoughts, new assessments, and a new push to think about your practice,” Barker concluded.

Kyle Schumacher, superintendent of Telluride School District R-1, attended with a team of his educators to hear more about what teaching needs to look like and should look like moving forward in this century.

“21st century skills are not just about technology. It’s about learning strategies, learning styles, entrepreneurialism and creative thinking. All of those things I’m excited to hear about” at the conference, said Schumacher.

Telluride performs well on state tests, but Schumacher recognizes the opportunities to grow beyond test scores and prepare students for the global economy. Schumacher said the new evaluation system gives teachers a great opportunity to be on the ground floor of this change and help guide how public education will look in the future.

“It’s about ongoing professional development,” Schumacher said of educator evaluations. “My role is to help educators see this isn’t about ‘got’cha’, this isn’t about ‘you’re doing something wrong.’ It’s about taking what we’re doing and changing that to better align with the outcomes that we need our students to have.”

Jeff Schell, the president of the Durango School Board, also attended the training and agreed with Schumacher that his board is focused on a belief that “we have a great staff and we can make them even better.”

Schell added he was excited to take part in a training experience with CEA and his local, Durango Education Association.

“What we did today here wouldn’t have happened ten years ago,” Schell observed. “A lot of the adversarial relationships that were there in the past seem to be dissipating as we all recognize that we need to look at student achievement as part of an evaluation process.”

Diana Hill-Wright

Diana Hill-Wright, a math and science teacher of 23 years and DEA member, also enjoyed the spirit of collaboration at the conference and seeing her Association move student learning forward with the leaders of Durango 9-R.

“I was thrilled to see the alignment of our teachers’ association supporting teachers for the good of children. To see my association take that on and help us through a new law and new mandates is amazing,” said Hill-Wright. “Being part of this association is huge for our learning curve and growing as a profession.”

Filed under: Evaluation, Quality Teachers, SB 191, Teaching Profession | Tagged: Durango, educator effectiveness, Linda Barker, professional development | Leave a Comment »

TELL Colorado Survey begins February 6

Posted on January 15, 2013 by ceawhatworks

As educators know, there is a clear connection between teaching conditions and student learning. This is why CEA is working with statewide partners for the third time to offer the TELL Colorado Survey to teachers from February 6 to March 6. We want to find out more about Colorado’s K-12 schools from the people who know them the best.

The TELL Colorado Survey is an anonymous, online survey which gives teachers and other licensed school-based educators the opportunity to tell their perceptions of the teaching and learning conditions in their schools. The survey data will provide educators, schools, districts, the Legislature, Colorado Department of Education (CDE), and CEA and its partners with information we can all use to improve our schools and support pro-education policies.

The TELL Colorado Survey (TELL stands for Teaching, Empowering, Leading, and Learning) was offered in 2009 and 2011, supported by funding from the Legislature. State-based versions of the survey are offered in a dozen other states in partnership with The New Teacher Center. CEA is working with CDE, CASE, CASB, the League of Charter Schools, and the Colorado Federation of Teachers on this year’s survey.

The TELL Colorado survey takes about 20-30 minutes and addresses issues of time, empowerment, leadership, resources, student conduct, community engagement, professional development, and mentoring. In their schools during the last week of January, educators will get individual letters with personal codes for taking the survey. After the close of the survey on March 6, The New Teacher Center will analyze data from all the schools that have sufficient participation for a written, school level report. Through this analysis, each school will have its own data to use in school improvement planning. The initial data will be available beginning in April.

Filed under: Funding, News, Public Education, Quality Teachers, Teaching and learning conditions, Teaching Profession, TELL Survey, Uncategorized | Tagged: 21st century skills and teaching, CEA, Colorado Education Association, educator effectiveness, quality teacher, teacher effectiveness, teaching and learning conditions | Leave a Comment »

Denver teacher offers her take on Won’t Back Down movie

Posted on October 1, 2012 by ceawhatworks

Won’t Back Down is a work of fiction that looks to parent trigger laws as a strategy for school reform. I want to emphasize the word fiction for anyone who missed it the first time. Much has already been written about the film, for or against it. I will share what I know to be non-fiction, based on my 25 years of practice as an accomplished teacher. These things I know…

I am one of “those” kids. When speaking of kids living in poverty, many people refer to “those” kids. This is not a reason to feel sorry for them (or me) or to make excuses about why we cannot learn. But it is the first step in creating separation between people and factions.

In Lisa Delpit’s Other People’s Children, she suggests that as long as we consider “those” children as other people’s children and not “our” children, we will never provide all students the education that they need and deserve. Pronouns can mean a lot. I have been one of “those” kids and can speak from experience about what “we” need and what we don’t. But even those whose demographic data is different can help support our children. All of them.

Perpetuating separation and divisiveness maintains the status quo. Pitting parents against unions, teachers against parents, Teach for America teachers against career teachers, veteran teachers against novice teachers and ed reformers against unions ensures that we stay mired in division that simply maintains the situation as it is. Casting blame and shame only perpetuates the false dichotomy of us versus them. Meanwhile, our kids sit by day after day while adults play power games at their expense.

Meaningful change requires collective action. Margaret Wheatley in Leadership and the New Science, suggests that, “Real change happens…only when we take time to discover what’s worthy of our shared attention.”

As it turns out, it’s not so difficult to identify factors that are worthy of our shared attention. For example, teacher evaluation must improve to encourage individual teachers’ growth and, when necessary, allow for dismissal. School leaders need to be equipped with the tools and resources necessary to support teaching and learning. We need to rethink school design so we can tailor instruction to students’ needs.

But creating systemic and sustainable change will require us ALL to work together to redesign the system for our kids. And teachers must play critical roles in identifying solutions—for we will be the ones who bring the changes to life in the classroom each day.

We WILL change the system when we actually muster up enough will to do so. As long as all of the different factions involved in education hold tight to oppositional roles, we will not muster the will to actually change anything. When we REALLY decide that ALL students deserve a quality public education—when that becomes our genuine priority and is the outlet for our energy and motivation— then we will make that change happen. It is as simple as that.

Our kids and our country deserve better.

I, for one, am ready to collaborate. Are you? I don’t care what factions you’re part of, what label you wear, or what your history (or your organization’s history) may have been. I am willing to work alongside all who are truly dedicated to supporting the collective action and systemic change that is so sorely needed by our most vulnerable kids.

Our kids do not have time to waste on adults slinging mud like children. Our kids and our country deserve a better public education system and I intend to help provide it for them.

Who among us is willing to lift yourself up out of the divisiveness, connect around a common vision and create a system that works for all children? While some “won’t back down,” I Will Stand Up for our kids, for our community and for my profession. Will you join me?

Lori Nazareno, NBCT
Teacher in Residence, Center for Teaching Quality
Denver Classroom Teachers Association-CEA-NEA Member

Filed under: Early childhood literacy, News, Parental Involvement, Public Education, Quality Teachers, Teaching and learning conditions, Teaching Profession | Tagged: 21st century skills and teaching, CEA, Colorado Education Association, education, educator effectiveness, Evaluation, public education, quality teacher, student achievement, teacher quality | Leave a Comment »

April 11: State Board to consider SB 191 teacher evaluation appeals process

Posted on April 10, 2012 by ceawhatworks

Tomorrow the State Board of Education will vote on the appeals process in Senate Bill 191, the teacher-principal evaluation system. The board’s vote is part of the rulemaking process on education legislation. After the State Board’s vote, the new rule goes to the Legislature where the House and Senate will vote on it.

The new law provides for a system to evaluate the effectiveness of licensed teachers and principals. In the past, state law required districts to rate educators as satisfactory or not satisfactory. When the law is fully implemented, principals’ evaluations will put teachers in one of four categories (highly effective, effective, partially effective, ineffective), and a teacher’s nonprobationary status will be based on effectiveness in the classroom.

Beginning with the 2013-14 school year, each district shall ensure that a non-probationary teacher who objects to a second consecutive Ineffective or Partially Effective rating has the opportunity to appeal because, at this point, the teacher is at risk of losing non-probationary status.

President Beverly Ingle’s CEA Journal column (April-May 2012 issue) outlines the district-level appeals panels our Association believes are critical.

Honor the State Council’s work on appeals process by adopting its recommendations
Our Association has supported the work of the State Council on Educator Effectiveness (SCEE) since the council convened in 2010 in connection with Senate Bill 191, the teacher and principal evaluation law. Three CEA members have served on the council for many months on behalf of all Colorado public school teachers: Amie Baca-Oehlert, District Twelve EA; Kerrie Dallman, Jefferson County EA; and Jim Smyth, Mesa Valley EA.

Now the State Board of Education is developing rules for an appeals process that will be part of the new evaluation system. In the last few months, SCEE – not only teachers, also school board members, principals, a parent, a businessman, a university professor, others – crafted well researched, thoughtful recommendations for the process for a teacher to appeal a second consecutive rating of Partially Effective or Ineffective in the new evaluation system.

From my perspective as a classroom teacher, the council’s recommendations are an impressive example of how a large group of people with different interests and expertise can come together and reach consensus for the benefit of our students.

We fully support SCEE’s recommendations for the appeals process. The State Board is considering them and other groups’ ideas from March 30-April 11. CEA has urged the State Board to defer to the council’s recommendations and adopt them. Here’s why:

The premise guiding the council’s work is that educators need a fair, credible evaluation system if they are to be effective educators. To make sure that the evaluation system being developed under SB 191 is fair and credible, we believe we need an appeals panel that has an equal number of teachers and administrators on it. This appeals panel would promote shared leadership among teachers and principals and give a teacher an evenhanded opportunity to present information to show that the rating should have instead been “effective.”
A teacher who appeals an ineffective or partially effective evaluation rating must be able to put his or her trust in the evaluation process and the appeals process. The teacher must know that the data and evidence the evaluator used to determine the rating was accurate data and the evaluation process was followed.

We do not believe that school districts should use any appeals process other than a panel of equal numbers of teachers and administrators. For example, a superintendent or other district official should not hear a teacher’s appeal and decide whether he or she deserves the ineffective rating.

We expect that the system the council designed and recommended to the State Board may need some adjustment as we travel through the uncharted waters of a new evaluation system, first with the pilot districts and later in statewide implementation.

We are in complete agreement that the Council’s recommended appeals process will meet the needs of our students, teachers, and school districts. We urge the State Board of Education to honor the council’s work and adopt the council’s recommendations on April 11.

For a teacher, the appeals process is an assurance that an impartial panel of one’s peers and administrators thoughtfully reviewed the teacher’s evidence to determine if it warrants a decision to uphold the evaluation rating.

For teachers, the appeals process is an affirmation that Colorado’s teacher evaluation system is thorough and rigorous. The appeals process is a means of demonstrating that we own our profession. We are helping shape our profession, we care for its well being, and we are responsible for its successes or failures.

Filed under: Evaluation, News, Public Education, Quality Teachers, SB 191, Teaching Profession | Tagged: Beverly Ingle, CEA, Colorado Education Association, Council for Educator Effectiveness, educator effectiveness, legislature, quality teacher, teacher effectiveness | Leave a Comment »

Teacher unions step up to lead education reform

Posted on February 22, 2012 by ceawhatworks

NEA President Dennis Van Roekel is featured on the front page of the Huffington Post’s Education section today, talking about NEA’s Priority Schools
Campaign and what educators are doing to improve schools and boost student achievement.

Van Roekel, an Arizona high school math teacher, wrote about Romulus Middle School in Detroit, summarizing what he learned about the school as he studied how educators there were working to improve it. Van Roekel said, “After countless grand policy initiatives, and decades of education reforms and gusts of innovation, here is the lesson I think we can draw: the only way to turn around struggling schools is to work together — by demanding concrete changes that make low student achievement totally unacceptable for any group of students.

“Done right, this approach can not only help students in so-called “failing” schools, but is a scalable strategy for fixing America’s troubled urban school systems. It’s hard work, and the transformation won’t happen overnight, but that’s all the more reason to get started as soon as possible.”

Read the entire blog post at Huffington Post’s Education section and comment on what Van Roekel has to say.

Filed under: News, Parental Involvement, Public Education, Quality Teachers, Teaching and learning conditions, Teaching Profession | Tagged: 21st century skills and teaching, CEA, Colorado Education Association, Dennis Van Roekel, educator effectiveness, national education association, NEA, quality teacher, student achievement, teacher effectiveness, teacher quality | Leave a Comment »

Two interactive, town-hall discussions for educators

Posted on September 22, 2011 by ceawhatworks

Sign up for the Education Nation Town Hall - let your voice be heard Sunday

We hope you will join the live Teacher Town Hall web chat at 10:00 a.m., Sunday, September 25 (Colorado time), and tell the public about the teaching profession. The Teacher Town Hall is part of NBC’s week-long Education Nation program.

Register here for the online web chat with fellow teachers.

NEA President Dennis Van Roekel will appear on a panel, and it’s likely that at least one Colorado teacher will also be featured. Join them and educators from every state to share your ideas on teaching challenges and opportunities.

Join CEA’s educator effectiveness tele-town hall, Wednesday

We’ll hold a town hall meeting over teleconference for Association members on Wednesday, September 28, from 4:00-5:00 p.m., where you can hear the latest developments on Senate Bill 191 and the State Board of Education’s proposed rules for the law. The meeting is timed for the week before the State Board’s October 5 meeting, the last opportunity for the public to weigh in on the law before the board finalizes its rules and sends them to the Legislature.

The State Council for Educator Effectiveness, after working for many months, recommended a statewide teacher-principal evaluation system to the State Board of Education in August. The council designed a single framework for teacher and principal evaluations in a fair, transparent, timely, rigorous, and valid system that every district will use. The town hall meeting will explain conflicts we have with the State Board’s rules and how educators can act to see the realization of the State Council’s vision. Plenty of time will be allotted for your questions.

When you register, you will get all the information you need for the town hall. Please provide your personal email, instead of school email, at this registration link.

Filed under: Evaluation, Public Education, Quality Teachers, SB 191, Teaching and learning conditions, Teaching Profession | Tagged: Education Nation, educator effectiveness, NBC, SB 191, town hall | Leave a Comment »

Improving Teacher Quality by Improving Evaluation

Posted on March 18, 2010 by ceawhatworks

This past Sunday, the Denver Post published an article called “Schools focus on teaching quality as they seek funding,” by Karen Auge. Her piece provided an interesting perspective on teacher evaluation. The following are some quotes from the article:

• “Improving teacher assessment is a primary goal of the governor’s 15-member Council on Educator Effectiveness, which held its first meeting Thursday. The good news is that everyone, from union leaders to lawmakers, agrees Colorado’s existing evaluation system needs an overhaul and that student performance should be a part of any new system.”

• “‘We want quality evaluations. Every teacher wants the teacher next door and the teacher who sends kids from last year to their class to be doing a good job,’ [CEA spokesperson Deborah] Fallin said.”

• “‘Research now is extremely clear: The most important factor in a student’s education is the quality of the teacher,’ said Tom Boasberg, superintendent of Denver Public Schools.”

• “The things she [Jana Thomas – fourth-grade science teacher] learned in teacher-education classes had value…But her real education came courtesy of other teachers. ‘Who your mentors are is huge,’ she said.”

Effective evaluation systems are an important part of how we ensure a quality teacher in every classroom. We believe Colorado must have an evaluation system that is:
• Consistent
• Fair
• Objective and
• Directed at improvement.

We encourage you to read the article. If you want to share your observations on our blog, we encourage you to do so.