I am worried about adding another metric to the way that we measure performance in schools. It's already been shown that there are problems with the standardized tests. Not that they are terrible things, but students in the US tend to disagree with their proliferation. (Perhaps they would feel less this way if there were less tests)
Having students grade the teachers I think is also the same way. One of the problems is that students don't know what makes a good teacher. The tests can gear students in that direction (ie "I feel challenged but not overwhelmed in this classroom"), but if we look for too much insight from the students I think we will be misdirected. Just like we are misdirected when we pay too much attention to standardized tests.
My fear is that some schools would start to look at these performance measurements as golden bullets sort the way that we've started to look at standardized tests as golden bullets. Most of jr. high was geared towards getting perfect scores on the state exams. My Junior and Senior years of high school were almost 100% (a few teachers went outside of the scope, but it was a teacher decision and not an administrative decision) geared around AP tests and the ACT.
The ACT and the AP tests have their place. And I think that student evaluations of teachers have their place as well. Both are very useful when applied appropriately.
I just don't want to see the system (d)evolve in such a way that too much emphasis is placed on empirical data.
"One of the problems is that students don't know what makes a good teacher."
Students don't need to know what makes a good teacher. They only need to be able to assess whether they learned, and whether they had fun in the process. Whether they learned enough is pretty much an orthogonal issue, and one that can and will be dealt with through standardized testing. Students also don't really need to give any thought to a teacher's specific methods in order to offer useful information.
Having students grade the teachers I think is also the same way. One of the problems is that students don't know what makes a good teacher. The tests can gear students in that direction (ie "I feel challenged but not overwhelmed in this classroom"), but if we look for too much insight from the students I think we will be misdirected. Just like we are misdirected when we pay too much attention to standardized tests.
My fear is that some schools would start to look at these performance measurements as golden bullets sort the way that we've started to look at standardized tests as golden bullets. Most of jr. high was geared towards getting perfect scores on the state exams. My Junior and Senior years of high school were almost 100% (a few teachers went outside of the scope, but it was a teacher decision and not an administrative decision) geared around AP tests and the ACT.
The ACT and the AP tests have their place. And I think that student evaluations of teachers have their place as well. Both are very useful when applied appropriately.
I just don't want to see the system (d)evolve in such a way that too much emphasis is placed on empirical data.