Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal published a short article on teacher evaluation and performance pay efforts in a handful of school districts, including Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS). The article outlined the fiscal, political, and methodological difficulties of implementing a comprehensive evaluation system for teachers across subjects and grades.
The CMS experience was instructive. School district leaders demonstrated how NOT to implement an evaluation program. You need buy-in from teachers and parents, as well as reliable (or established) evaluation instruments. CMS had neither.
As John Hood pointed out, crafting a sound program to evaluate teachers may be difficult, but it is well worth the time and effort to do it right.