The superintendent of San Jose Unified and leaders of the district'due south teachers union accept agreed on an innovative evaluation and compensation system that, if implemented, would be significantly dissimilar from any in California. With education groups in Sacramento and legislators nevertheless bruised over a grueling, failed effort to revise the state's teacher evaluation police force last summer, the San Jose program offers hope that a progressive compromise on divisive issues is possible.

Among the pregnant features in the San Jose agreement:

  • Pay and performance would be linked; teachers who receive an unsatisfactory review, triggering an improvement plan, would miss a raise on the scheduled bacon scale for that year.
  • Consulting teachers – a newly created position – would participate with the principals on all evaluations of probationary teachers and on evaluations of experienced teachers if requested after a primary's initial review; Instructor Quality Panels, fabricated up of teachers and administrators, would review decisions at key junctures along the fashion.
  • An evaluation would include multiple perspectives of a instructor's piece of work, every bit measured by breezy classroom walkthroughs, formal observations, interactions with the primary, feedback from peers, a student/parent survey, and personal reflections. Measures of educatee growth would be an integral office for all teachers, not just those in grades and subjects given standardized tests. California Standards Tests, which are to be phased out in 2 years, won't be used; district tests that establish growth over the course of a twelvemonth might be. Assessments for Mutual Core standards, which will be rolled out nationally two years from now, will be studied to run across if they're appropriate for evaluations.
  • There would be new career positions offering pay that's about 10 percent higher for a model instructor and 30 percentage higher for a principal teacher than the new maximum for a veteran teacher; the new career opportunities would be renewable iii-year assignments for nigh the superlative 20 percent of teachers who'd be selected through a rigorous awarding process.
  • Teachers could opt into a new, compressed bacon scale in which they would reach a salary level in 13 years ($79,500) that they now reach in 21 years, simply they also would max out at that salary level. Teachers with 30 years experience now earn $87,228. The simply mode to make more than money under the new calibration would be to become a model or primary teacher.
San Jose Unified Superintendent Vincent Matthews, left, and San Jose Teachers Association President Stephen McMahon and staffs worked nearly two years on the evaluation and pay proposal. Click to enlarge (photo by John Fensterwald).

San Jose Unified Superintendent Vincent Matthews, left, and San Jose Teachers Clan President Stephen McMahon and staffs worked nearly 2 years on the evaluation and pay proposal. Click to enlarge (photograph past John Fensterwald).

A team of administrators and teachers spent two years hashing out the details of this plan, and details yet have to exist worked out. Both Superintendent Vincent Matthews and San Jose Teachers Association president Stephen McMahon say they're enthusiastic about it.

From Matthews' perspective, the pay and evaluation package are of import to "ensure that teachers are looked at equally professionals."

For McMahon, the new compensation system is what teachers have said they want – a style to earn more than without leaving the classroom to become an administrator and a system that reflects the effort they put in. "Teachers say to me, 'I work hard just am paid $20,000 less than my neighbor who doesn't work as hard,'" McMahon said.

Challenges ahead

Moving alee with the organisation is contingent on approval by the San Jose school board and the union membership next spring, and the Legislature will have to give its OK to several components that don't conform with state constabulary (formal reviews every three years, instead of five; perhaps the role of consulting teachers to evaluate peers; and the pay freeze for unsatisfactory reviews). Whether or not the alternative bacon calibration is cost-neutral will depend on how many teachers opt in. The district is also counting on foundations or the federal government's Instructor Incentive Fund initially to fund the model and master teacher positions. (San Jose Unified applied only didn't go the latest round of TIF funding. Los Angeles Unified did, receiving $49 1000000.)

But the big potential wrench in the works would be the failure of San Jose voters to fund a bail mensurate that would save several million dollars in yearly utility bills, and the defeat of either Proposition 30 or 38, tax initiatives yielding billions of dollars for M-12 schools over the next six to 12 years. Without new coin, the reforms will be off the tabular array and instead there will exist "a whole different chat" – hard negotiations over how many furlough days teachers must have in the next school year, Matthews said.

San Jose incorporates elements of what'south working or in the works elsewhere. The Peer Assistance and Review (PAR) programs in San Juan Unified and Poway Unified employ a panel of teachers and administrators who recommend tenure decisions for probationary teachers and employment deportment for teachers with unsatisfactory reviews, then assign mentor teachers to work with struggling teachers. The proposed Teacher Quality Panels, which will serve every bit judge and jury over the evaluation procedure, are based on a model in Montgomery County, MD, McMahon said.

The proposed rubrics for evaluations are similar to the six domains of the California Standards for the Teaching Profession, which are used in evaluations in Long Beach Unified; AB five, the instructor evaluation bill that died in the Legislature in August, as well highlighted these standards. Los Angeles Unified is trying a voluntary pilot of an evaluation system that too will combine student examination scores with classroom observations and parent surveys. Still, negotiations with United Teachers Los Angeles have hit a snag over how much weight should be given to standardized test results.

With funding from a 7-twelvemonth grant from the Gates Foundation, called The College-Ready Promise, several lease school organizations (including i unionized charter system, Green Dot Public Schools) are as well tying pay raises to evaluations, but they are weighted heavily to CST results (xl pct of a teacher's evaluation) – an approach that the San Jose Teachers Clan and the California Teachers Association oppose. San Jose Unified would be the start to link decisions affecting pay to a wedlock bacon scale.

The evaluations would essentially be pass-fail; either teachers would receive the full 10 points qualifying for the next pay level or, nix points followed by a plan for improvement. That manner, McMahon and Matthews said, the bigger goal – promoting more constructive didactics – wouldn't become sidetracked over arguments virtually whether a instructor deserved vi or seven points or a partial or full raise. Teachers who corrected their weaknesses would be back on track for a raise the following year. Those who didn't could face dismissal.

Although experienced teachers would be scheduled for reviews every three years, information technology'southward possible, said McMahon, for another full-blown review before and then. As an example, a principal could request 1 if peer feedback indicated that a teacher didn't collaborate well or surveys revealed a teacher alienated most parents. The Teacher Quality Panel would have to agree that another review was justified.

Matthews predicated that betwixt 100 and 200 – half dozen to 12 percent – of the district'south ane,700 teachers would initially receive unsatisfactory reviews; McMahon estimated information technology would exist closer to 75. Both agreed the number would decrease equally teachers addressed areas of concern or were forced out of a task.

At the aforementioned fourth dimension, approximately 15 pct of teachers could become model teachers and five percentage or so could be hired equally master teachers at the maximum salary. Because many of the slots for model teachers would be allotted to low-performing schools, the district would be sending some of its best teachers to work with kids with the greatest needs. Model teachers, who exemplify best teaching practices, would exist a resource to other teachers in their schoolhouse. Primary teachers would have leadership roles and responsibilities beyond the classroom.

A compressed schedule for new teachers could make San Jose Unified attractive to college graduates and those seeking mid-career changes, who don't necessarily view teaching every bit a xxx-twelvemonth career, every bit previous generations did, but besides add together value to career employees, McMahon said. It would besides requite the district a competitive reward in the regional marketplace.

One of the arguments of opponents of Props thirty and 38 is that major didactics reforms won't happen until schoolhouse districts are squeezed to the point of making change happen. San Jose Unified represents the contrary: More cuts to schools will kill significant  compensation and evaluation reforms before they're given a chance.

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