Teacher Evaluations Should Be Secret: Haslam

Governor Bill Haslam says the state’s evaluations of teachers should be confidential. A bill to close teacher performance reviews to the public is on its way to a floor vote in the state senate, and passed out of a House subcommittee today.

Haslam says the point of evaluations is to help teachers improve, and he figures if reviews are made public then classroom evaluators will be less honest. And Haslam argues if bad job reviews look like a kind of punishment, it could turn off young people from becoming teachers:

“So if I’m a 20-year-old thinking about teaching, and I’m saying ‘Huh. Every quarter – every half-year, whatever – my evaluation’s going to be out there in the paper, am I…?’
I mean, I’d ask of you – do you want to do that? Have your evaluations be in the paper twice a year? Or would that make you less likely to choose that profession?”

Critics argue the reviews give parents, reporters and others a chance to judge whether sweeping education reform efforts in the state are working.

Link to the bill here: SB1447 Tracy/HB1908 Montgomery.