Should the evaluation of some Tennessee public school teachers be judged substantially on the standardized test scores of students in areas in which they do not teach? Absolutely not. Do all teachers, regardless of what they teach, bear some responsibility for the school's overall test score? Yes, but not a lot.
Gov. Bill Haslam has proposed legislation that would change teacher evaluations, in one measurement, by lowering the weight of Tennessee Value-Added Assessment System data in nontested subjects from 25 to 15 percent, but Tennessee's largest teachers union is not waiting on legislative remedies. On Thursday, it filed a federal lawsuit that challenges how the state uses standardized scores to evaluate teachers.
The lawsuit said the evaluations of more than half of the state's public school teachers are based substantially -- 35 percent -- on the standardized test scores of students in subjects they do not teach. Because of the test data, the lawsuit said, some teachers' evaluation scores have dropped, one was denied a bonus and one lost eligibility to be recommended for tenure.
Over the last several decades, teacher evaluations have become more strict, and rightly so. For years, poor teachers entered the system, became tenured and continued to adversely affect students. Teaching, though, should be a difficult profession to enter, should be a closely monitored profession and should be a better compensated profession. Unfortunately, in trying to weed out poor teachers, the pendulum swung too far to the other side in how it evaluates teachers.
Going forward, and perhaps heading off the lawsuit, the governor and General Assembly should work together during this legislative session to create a still rigorous but fairer evaluation system.