Texas Commissioner of Education Michael Williams has been meeting one-on-one with school superintendents, hoping to design a template for teacher evaluations.
As part of an agreement Williams reached with the U.S. Department of Education in order to opt out of the federal No Child Left Behind program, Williams must design a solution for how schools evaluate teachers by May 2014.
"I am talking to superintendents and I am pleased, quite frankly, for teachers to be evaluated and to some degree, student growth be a part of that evaluation," Williams said.
Some teachers are concerned about evaluations based on student growth, which includes test scores.
Clay Robinson, public affairs for the Texas State Teachers Association, said standardized test scores are reflective of the teacher whose being evaluated in the present tense.
"Do not revolve it around one test score," Robinson said. "Teaching is a continuous collaborative effort. A kid makes a good score in the third grade because of his kindergarten and first and second grade teachers who helped him learn how to learn."
Williams said he hasn’t determined what percentage of a teacher evaluation will be based on standardized test scores.
