I'm almost positive I heard about this Paul Thomas essay from my friend the Displaced Plainsman. Even if I didn't, it certainly sounds like something DP would blog.
Thomas explains how a fundamental value position—here, a commitment to human agency, autonomy, and democracy—leads to practical policy positions... and an indictment of a system of teacher accountability based on high-stakes tests:
Let me clarify here that I have been a teacher from the middle school level through graduate education for 27 years now. In that time, I have taught thousands of students of nearly every possible ability, background, and level of commitment. For the record, I have not caused a single one of those students to learn.
Teachers in an education system designed for a free society and people are not cause agents but mechanisms for designing, providing, and enhancing learning experiences for every student regardless of that student's station in life. Ultimately, a student who is free is the final determinant of whether or not learning occurs&ndashas long as that student's life allows that choice.
Calls for teacher accountability tied to student outcomes, such as tests, misrepresent the ethical role of a teacher in a free society. Few people take the time to consider that viewing a teacher as a cause agent (holding a teacher accountable for the behavior of another free human) and viewing learning as the mere transmission of knowledge from a teacher-authority to a passive class of students are antithetical to our beliefs in individual freedom and democracy [Paul Thomas, "How Do Teachers matter? Not as Cause Agents But as Learning Opporuntities," Daily Censored, 2011.05.27].
Thomas argues that instead of measuring teachers through student outcomes, we must do the harder work of analyzing the quality of the opportunities they provide students.
A system of self-evaluation, peer-evaluation, and supervisor-based evaluation&ndashdesigned to support and not punish or reward&ndashthat addresses teacher competence (content and pedagogy) and, above all else, the quality of the educational opportunities offered to students regardless of their background is the sort of teacher accountability and education reform we must seek [Thomas, 2011].
Heady stuff. Thomas's essay does not boil down easily into quick blog bits. Read the whole thing, then think about what you expect of your teachers.
Maybe we should more clearly define the meaning of the term "outcome."
Parallel notion(?): To what extent does the overall health of the patient reflect on the competence of the doctor?
As I look back on my "career as a student," I can say that I learned more from some teachers than I did from others. However, in some cases I learned the most in the classes where my grades were the worst.
Just thinkin'. Three cups of coffee for two brain cells in the middle of the night will do that to ya.