The President says . . .

In this article in last week’s Los Angeles Times President Obama once again speaks to the need to judge teachers by how well their students do on some type of assessment.

Obama called for the abolition of "firewall" rules, which prevent many schools from judging teacher performance based on student performance.

I believe that we should be held accountable for the learning of all students, but for me the operative word is we. Teachers work in schools, that are in school districts, that operate within state guidelines and funding mechanisms. Yes, the research is quite clear that the teacher is the single most important variable in this equation, but we can’t ignore the system within which teachers and students engage.

I believe that there can and should be a point in time when we will be able to link student achievement with teacher performance. That time, however, will come after we work collaboratively to identify the support that is necessary over time to achieve a “teaching standard” that results in teacher accountability for student achievement. The support is the responsibility of the system to provide under the guidance of the building leadership of which the principal is the key player. Then there will be the issue of what assessment(s), in what content areas, and over what period of time

I wonder if the President and others pushing this agenda are seeing this accountability only for what we traditionally call the core content areas or for teachers in all content areas. Is the accountability standard the same for the first year teacher and for those in the profession for longer periods of time? Will states be allowed to identify the standards and determine the cut scores for assessing success or will they be national standards? There are many questions that need answers before we can successfully implement this change.

It was interesting that the President made these remarks in a charter middle school. He and the education department have made their support of charters quite clear. I also found the following statement quite interesting.

"If a state wants to increase its chances of actually winning a grant, it will have to do more," Obama said. "It will have to collect information about how students are doing in a particular year -- and over the course of an academic career -- and make this information available to teachers so they can use it to improve the way they teach. That's how teachers can determine what they should be doing differently in the classroom. That's how principals can determine what changes need to be made in our schools."

If only it were that easy. It will take much more than simply making achievement data available to teachers to achieve the President’s vision. The data is only one critical component of a very complex system. Forcing change on this system through grants is not the key to successful change that sustains over time. Yes, we need to change and we must ensure that all young people experience K-12 success and are prepared for continued success in post high school learning and work. That is what we are working to achieve for the students in our school system.