Public education: evaluate to progress

Timothy Knowles, head of the University of Chicago’s Urban Education Institute, says that the best predictor of teacher effectiveness is student evaluations. An evaluation by students would be a useful supplement to the standardized tests currently in use for teacher evaluation.

As students evaluate teachers, teachers should get a chance to evaluate the performance of school administrators. Official paperwork and required tasks for teachers encroaches on classroom time, and there should be some way for every teacher to comment on this development. Clearly, teaching suffers when teachers are burdened with extraneous tasks.

Lastly, an elected [Asheville city] school board should replace our appointed one. An election would provide an opportunity to discuss and examine these important issues.

— Bob Brown
Asheville

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