By Brandi Watters, Herald Bulletin Staff Writer
brandi.watters@heraldbulletin.com
ANDERSON - A new policy adopted by the Anderson Community Schools board could change the ways teachers are evaluated.
Rick Muir, president of the Anderson Federation of Teachers, said the measure has been in the works for three years, and is modeled after a Toledo, Ohio, evaluation program.
Anderson is the first school district in Indiana to adopt the program.
The Peer Assistance and Review program approved by the board creates between one and three consulting teacher positions meant to oversee and provide support to new teachers and seasoned ones who might be struggling in the classroom.
According to Muir, the first part of the program, the intern portion, applies to all new hires in the district. New teachers will be paired with a consulting teacher chosen by a nine-member panel that includes teachers, administrators and union representatives.
The consulting teacher is meant to mentor the new teacher in classroom management, teaching policies and best practices.
After two semesters, the consulting teacher will recommend to the panel whether the new teacher should be terminated or given a contract with the district.
The second part of the program involves intervention. The intervention program is meant to help existing ACS teachers who may not be succeeding in the classroom. Teachers may end up in the intervention program if a principal or committee of the teacher's peers deems the program necessary.
The committees will exist in each building, Muir said, and will be elected by teachers and staff each school year.
Once a teacher has been recommended for intervention by the committee, the panel must make the final decision to assign a consulting teacher and begin the intervention.
After some time working to help improve the teacher's classroom performance, the consulting teacher may recommend that the educator be terminated.
The final decision for any termination would be made by the school board, Muir said.
Since the union first proposed the program and voted to ratify it, Muir said the measure goes a long way to demonstrate that unions do not protect bad teachers, as some may believe. "We're talking about an evaluation that guarantees only the best teachers will stay with us in the school district."
The program will come at a cost to the school district. Consulting teachers will not teach classes but will continue receiving a teacher's salary and benefits on top of a stipend estimated at $6,100.
The full-time job of the consulting teacher, Muir said, is to provide assistance for new hires and struggling teachers.
Consulting teacher candidates must have worked in the district for five years, he said. After three years as a consulting teacher, educators are returned to the classroom. "It's so that they don't lose touch with the classroom," Muir said.
Initially, he said, the district will only hire between one and three consulting teachers.
Due to budget cuts, he does not expect very many new hires who would need the services of a consulting teacher, but all existing teachers are subject to intervention if it's deemed necessary.
Muir said the program changes the way Anderson schools operate. "This is a big shift in the way things have always been done."
Brooke Blockson is a kindergarten teacher at Robinson Elementary School and said she could have used a peer review program when she started her career as an educator two years ago. Learning how to manage a classroom full of children and provide education was something Blockson admits that she struggled with initially.
Under the program, Blockson and other teachers are subject to scrutiny and possible termination but she is not concerned. "Anybody that's willing to take suggestions and do what's right for kids shouldn't be worried."
Robinson Elementary Principal Beth Clark was one of the school administrators who studied Toledo's similar program before bringing the concept to Anderson. She supports the new program. "It's support for teachers that hadn't been there before."