Houston Board Candidates Respond to their Teacher Evaluation System
For a recent article in the Houston Chronicle, the newspaper sent 12 current candidates for the Houston Independent School District (HISD) School Board a series of questions about HISD, to which seven candidates responded. The seven candidates’ responses are of specific interest here in that HISD is the district well-known for attaching more higher-stakes consequences to value-added output (e.g., teacher termination) than others (see for example here, here, and here). The seven candidates’ responses are of general interest in that the district uses the popular and (in)famous Education Value-Added Assessment System (EVAAS) for said purposes (see also here, here, and here). Accordingly, what these seven candidates have to say about the EVAAS and/or HISD’s teacher evaluation system might also be a sign of things to come, perhaps for the better, throughout HISD.
The questions are: (1) Do you support HISD’s current teacher evaluation system, which includes student test scores? Why or why not? What, if any, changes would you make? And (2) Do you support HISD’s current bonus system based on student test scores? Why or why not? What, if any, changes would you make? To see candidate names, their background information, their responses to other questions, etc. please read in full the article in the Houston Chronicle.
Here are the seven candidates’ responses to question #1:
- I do not support the current teacher evaluation system. Teacher’s performance should not rely on the current formula using the evaluation system with the amount of weight placed on student test scores. Too many obstacles outside the classroom affect student learning today that are unfair in this system. Other means of support such as a community school model must be put in place to support the whole Houston Board Candidates Respond to their Teacher Evaluation System | VAMboozled!:
