Education

I think Danielson herself is okay. At least, the part about professional growth and development, which is what I thought her primary purpose was.

When you take anything out of context, though, it's ripe for misuse. In the current climate, NOTHING is purely about professional growth and development; it all reeks of competition, bribe, and punishment. Using Danielson's framework, like my district is doing, for high-stakes evaluations that our jobs, and for some, our pay rates, depend on is a misuse, to say the least.

You end up with a bunch of supportive sounding talking points while feeling the knife at your back. A mixed message, to say the least.

Honestly, I read one of her books a couple of years before our district used it to develop an evaluation tool; when the evaluation tool was rolled out last year, I kept thinking that it didn't seem to fit what I remember having read. That, and since it "isn't primarily about evaluation," quoted from my district, it was combined with an evaluation system that doesn't really fit well. Ken Marshall's work has something to do with it.

Now I see Danielson has a bunch of stuff out specifically about evaluation. sigh. We had to watch a bunch of videos of her talking about evaluation, with clips of teachers and students in classrooms. She seemed to be more supportive and less critical in those videos; I think she'd decide more of us are proficient and distinguished than the admins doing the observations and evaluations do.

Also, when I look at the information provided on my district's "educator evaluation system" page, there are a bunch of links to corporate performance management as "suggested reading."

When you put it all together, to be honest, it sounds and feels like something from Rhee's new teacher project.