Many of you may remember back in 2010 when I spent a considerable amount of my time railing on the NJEA’s pathetic joke of a proposal for tenure reform. Governor Christie shared in my sentiments and today gave his acting Education Commissioner the honor of announcing the Administration’s tenure reform plan. The Christie plan is light years ahead of the NJEA’s proposal in essentially all aspect. Obviously this is not saying much considering the fact that the NJEA plan really changed nothing at all. This multi-faceted plan changes the system at the core. I can already hear the union whining in the distance.
The biggest change comes in the way that teachers will be evaluated under the new plan. This is the most crucial part of the reform proposal because the rest of it deals directly with the merit (or failure) of the teachers performance.
Currently in New Jersey teachers are grouped into two categories: Effective and Ineffective. Less than 1% of teachers fall into the ineffective category each year. The inadequacy of this system is baffling. Splitting teachers into two camps that do not allow the successful to float to the top makes little to no sense. So, to fix this glaring problem, the new evaluation standard will have four categories: Highly effective, Effective, Partially effective, and finally, Ineffective. Student performance would count towards at least half of the evaluation result. Having a ‘just past the line’ two category system encourages nothing but mediocrity, but a wider scale gives teachers something to strive for, especially since they will be rewarded for positive evaluations.
Next is that tenure will not longer simply be handed out. The current policy is that a teacher achieves tenure after three years and one day of teaching in a district. From this point on it becomes nearly impossible to remove this person for almost any reason. This is likely because the NJEA seems to believe that teaching is the only profession where three years of experience fully prepares a person for a life infallibility. Not anymore. This reform will change the policy so that a teacher may only receive tenure after three consecutive years of highly effective or effective ratings. Furthermore, teachers will be encouraged to maintain their performance after earning (instead of merely waiting out) the right to tenure. If a teacher earns poor evaluations in two years, tenure will be revoked and the process begins anew.
Teachers pay raises will now be tired to classroom performance rather than seniority. When the students do well, the teacher will do well. Also, there will be financial incentives for teachers to teach in certain districts in need, or in certain subjects of deficiency, like science or bilingual education.
All in all, this sounds like a great plan that will unfortunately need to go through mess of the democrat run legislature. It will no doubt be watered down with important elements removed (see Arbitration reform). Some democrats are already talking about introducing replacement bills in the coming weeks.
Everyone’s favorite union boss, Barbara Keshishian, gave a statement that amounted to a solid vote of no confidence in the teachers her NJEA represents. She feels that students in New Jersey will be “alarmed and dismayed” at reforms that would affect more than 100,000 teachers in the state. I am a bit puzzled by this comment. Is Keshishian suggesting that NJEA expects 100,000 teachers to fall below the standards lined out in this proposal that would be considered positive for students? If we take this absurd conclusion as true, then it shows the true need for reform in the first place. The two category system of evaluation, according to Keshishian, is letting 100,000 ‘ineffective’ teachers slip past the system by being too broad.
These reforms, while drastic by the standards we have been forced to endure literally a century, are pro-education and pro-teacher. Even assuming that teacher effectiveness is not the key ingredient to a “thorough and efficient” education, there is little doubt that it matters a great deal. Any changes we can make to bring a positive change to the education system of New Jersey, to help close the achievement gap between our rich and poor districts, and to put educators who actually want to (and should) be at the front of the class room there should be made with haste. This proposal is good for students, and its good for good teachers. The only people it wont be good for are those who currently ride a system that has clearly failed.
