Reconsidering the dual purposes of teacher evaluation.

TEACHER evaluation; EMPLOYEE reviews; TEACHER portfolios; ADULTS; HIGHER education

While countries differ in their approach to and context of teacher evaluation, many have one thing in common—they hope it serves its formative and summative purposes. In this article, the author asks policymakers, educators and researchers to reconsider how these dual purposes are accomplished. Current approaches and research both in and outside of the U.S. tend to focus on evaluator delivery of feedback, rather than teacher learning. The author examines the origin of formative and summative in the U.S. (since it influences thinking internationally), argues that it may be time to rethink beliefs about the role of principal in feedback delivery and improvement, and identifies strategies that promise to improve teaching practice, e.g., formative assessment, National Board Certification, professional development, coaching, professional learning communities, mentoring, and teacher advice networks. It may be time to think about a system of improvement that is complementary to teacher evaluation and supports teacher learning. This article is a reponse to Flores and Derrington's 2018 call to join the conversation about the contradictory purpose of accountability and improvement in their special issue 3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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