Shocking Report Recommends Evaluating Teachers By Performance

Next thing you know these teachers will start being held accountable for their performance. No doubt this will be interpreted as an attack on teachers.

New Jersey teachers should be judged by both their classroom performance and student test scores, a Christie administration task force recommended in a report made public Thursday.

This proposed evaluation system, if enacted by the Legislature, would influence high-stakes decisions about teachers’ pay and tenure once it’s phased in over the next few years. The report recommends piloting the system this fall.

"As a superintendent, it’s startling to me that we still use models of evaluations solely focused on teaching, rather than on teaching and learning," said Brian Zychowski, task force chairman and superintendent of North Brunswick schools.

The unveiling came one day after the state’s largest teachers union denounced any measurement of teachers based on student performance.

Yeah, how dare we judge them by how students perform. We should all just believe they're doing the best they can and take their word for it. And not even think of touching their lavish benefits or asking them to kick in more than 1.5% for their health benefits.

The New Jersey Education Association argued using student test scores to evaluate teachers would weaken curricula and promote teaching for the sake of passing a test. For this, Gov. Chris Christie once again publicly scolded the union.

"I find it fascinating that before the report was even issued or made public that the New Jersey Education Association already came out opposed to it," Christie said Thursday at a press conference. "Their charge is to protect the worst teachers, and they know the worst teachers will be outed."

Here's Christie discussing this radical plan to hold teachers accountable.