What Miss Post Taught Me About Evaluation - teacher evaluations - Brief Article

School Administrator, Jan, 1994 by Lee Saye

Genius was not provided for.

We had learned yet another "validated" observation instrument, a tool to erase mediocrity among our teachers. After five days of this, my head hurt. My colleagues left to plan at their own schools while I went home for an Alka-Seltzer. My heroes, you see, were shams.

Miss Post's fine irony, which instructed generations and was still quoted in operating rooms and executive suites, was sarcasm. There were others who left their indelible mark on me.

What to do? Next year I was to evaluate 50 teachers using an instrument in which I did not believe. In my mind, I consulted my sages.

Miss Post, her grim visage framed by black braids, her finger an inch from my nose, growled, "Well, Doctor Saye, if you don't like the one they gave you, write your own! What's the matter with you, anyway?"

Indeed. I cranked up my PC. What spewed out was 'The Magnificent Seven-Item Teacher Evaluation System."

Here are your instructions: Circle the appropriate reaction below the behavior described.

* No. 1: Once a year, in this teacher's class, a light flashes in a student's desperate, defeated mind and she exclaims, "I see! So that's how it works. I can do this, now. Look!"

(a) Every year; (b) Some years; (c) One year; (d) Never.

* No.2: Once a war, on some horrifying battlefield, a soldier who was on this teacher's athletic team says, "I can keep going for as long as it takes, and I can get up as many times as I'm knocked down. My coach taught me that."

(a) Every war; (b) Some wars; (c) One war; (d) Never.

* No. 3: Once an April, someone who was in this teacher's class stands beside the river in Stratford, and tears come to his eyes as he whispers, "William Shakespeare saw the scene I see now. He was actually here!"

(a) Every April; (b) Some Aprils; (c) One April; (d) Never.

* No. 4: Once a century, someone who was in this teacher's class faces an angry assembly, and says, "I know you are outraged and so am I, but this American has the right to speak her mind, just like all the rest of us."

(a) Every century; (b) Some centuries; (c) One century; (d) Never.

* No. 5: Every decade, a parent who was in this teacher's class finishes rebuilding an engine, then turns to an amazed offspring and says, "How'd I learn that? I had a good teacher, once."

(a) Every decade; (b) Some decades; (c) One decade; (d) Never.

* No. 6: Once in a great while, someone who was in this teacher's class says to a discouraged, emasculated spouse, "It will be all right. I have the skills to get a job and keep us going until you can find work again."

(a) Every great while; (b) Some great whiles; (c) One great while; (d) Never.

No. 7: Once in a lifetime, someone who was in this teacher's class looks up from a microscope and says, "We've done it. That awful scourge will kill no more."

(a) Every lifetime; (b) Some lifetimes; (c) One lifetime; (d) Never

A Fair Shake

Now score yourself: Each (a) counts 1 trillion; each (b) counts 1 billion; each (c) counts 1 million; and each (d) counts nothing at all.

Scores of one million or above entitle the teacher to a job and the world's undying gratitude. Scores of under one million entitle the teacher to try again next year, taking that one more last chance we are so famous for giving.

"Not any worse than usual," Miss Post may have snapped, looking at me through the bottoms of her bifocals and giving a barely discernible wink.

I would have treasured such a boundless compliment and hidden it in my heart forever. I think I'll pretend she really said it, and maybe somewhere she did.

Thank you ma'am, so very much. For that and for so much more. And don't worry. The teachers at my school will get a fair shake no matter what instrument we use.

"They had better," rumbled Miss Post.

Lee Saye, a former principal in DeKalb County, Ga., is a free-lance writer in Doraville, Ga.