Crazy Teacher Story Time: Subjective Evaluations 

A foreign language teacher told me this story: he teaches very advanced levels of a language, where the students are able to converse easily about a variety of topics. We have a saying in our district: those who can, teach. Those who can’t, become admins. (And those who get involved in public scandals get paid the big bucks and sent to Central Office.) Admin came in for an observation. Teacher decided to have some fun. Knowing the admin didn’t speak the language, he began making jokes about the guy. Spent the whole observation roasting the admin and inviting the students to join in. He got a perfect score on that evaluation for having “a very engaging and interactive lesson” and “creating an environment where students enjoyed learning.”

All i know is that i can be up and walking and talking and actively teaching all day. Sit down for 5 minutes while kids are working independently so i can put together work for absent students or take attendance or whatever. And that's the moment admin walks in for my eval. Every. Single. Time.

Honest to good true story. Teacher A is a "floater" who uses another teacher B's room one period. Teacher B has organized the room in a way that promotes student learning. Admin comes into B's room to evaluate A and gives glowing marks for the "innovative classroom arrangement". Same admin later comes into B's room (which hadn't changed one bit) to evaluate B and gives average marks for "classroom arrangement". When B asked why A received great marks for the room when B got average marks, the admin replied it was because "I hadn't seen that before observing A, but I had seen it before observing you." When B pointed out that it was HER room and SHE had done all the arrangements and A simply used what was already in place, the admin just shrugged and wouldn't change the marks. They want us to collaborate, but when you give another teacher a great idea on how to teach something the only person who gets a "wow, that's a great way" is the first person the admin sees doing it and everybody else is just "old news".

About collaboration: I lent my math lesson plans to another teacher who was pressed for time and wasn't able to write plans that weekend. We were both teaching the same thing, so I thought "Why not?" The other teacher was complemented on her wonderful, thorough lesson plans, but when I turned in the exact same plans (they were mine, after all) my administrator had not one compliment for me. Also after 23 years of teaching, receiving all excellent evaluations, suddenly one year I was deemed "In need of improvement" and placed on an improvement plan. During the classroom evaluation , the administrator asked one of my students ( a special ed student, as I was working as in in-class support teacher for special ed students) if she knew what she was learning. Of course , the kid said "no" even though her work from the class period clearly showed that she did know what she was learning. Still, this comment from a student was held against me. I have been retired for 2 years now, and I still get angry when I think about that year of my career. It was absurd.

Lol! I’ve been teaching HS ART in NYC 23 yrs and I have had the gamut of observations. First of all, no administer I have ever been observed by has ever been an art teacher nor do they understand all the drills, time and practice that goes into the ultimate finished and beautiful student art works. When I started in 1998, admin recognized this fact and gave me great observations. Then came COMMON CORE and that dastardly traitor DANIELSON. Neither of which really work for studio art. And of course the WORKSHOP model that we were all supposed to use which was ridiculous in that after the do now, the mini lesson, a critical reading piece then student hands on, followed by a wrap up and ending with an exit ticket in a 50 min class period. Sometimes allowed a grand total of 5-7 minutes to do the hands on, sometimes no time for the kids to do any hands on work. Then the big push was RIGOR. You ask 20 teachers and administrators what rigor means or looks like and you WILL get 20 different definitions. Admin will definitely tell you what isn’t rigorous with great authority. Apparently teaching the kids how to create portraitures is not rigorous-who knew? I had a principal tell me that he could care less if the kids could create “pretty pictures” I had to teach them what they needed in real life. Never mind the fact that NYS requires students to take a year of art to graduate and 2 of the 4 NYS Art standards are creating works of art and the use of different art materials. I accepted I would never get a higher rating from this principal than a developing. Then I was at this other school for about 4 months before the Union heard my pleas of desperation and moved me to a different school. That principal was CRAZY. She used the observations to decimate teachers she didn’t like. (Which was most of her teaching staff) I was tenured, so a bad observation (ineffective all around) didn’t hurt me. However several teachers were new and untenured. She managed to get them discontinued (ie fired). My close friend ended up getting discontinued and she turned around and sued the DOE and the principal. I’m happy to report she just won her case and 80,000$. So, unless the admin understands the complexity of a field like art or music the observations are always geared to what the admin might have taught before becoming an admin. (Academics) Not since approx 2001 or 2, have I found any observation to be useful in bettering my pedagogy at all. Oh and by the way, the gym teacher also had to teach his gym classes using the workshop model. Which of course left all of about 5-7 minutes for the kids to actually engage in exercise. Absolutely RIDICULOUS! He was also tenured so he was fine with getting across the board developings. The whole observation business is disheartening and a game of catching you out. Fortunately I get to retire with my full NYC pension and life time health insurance in only one and a half years! Yee haa! I love teaching art. I do not love teaching anything else. Considering I got my bachelors, my masters and 30 credits post masters in art, (Art is terminal degree so the highest level you can achieve is a Masters) it is very discouraging to be told that what I do best and spent 12 yrs learning how to do is irrelevant. That no matter how fantastic a students art work turns out, it will just be a “pretty picture” and thus not worthy of appreciation by admin. Needless to say, I took all my observations with a large grain of salt, (ie I ignored them) and carried on with celebrating, encouraging and inspiring the kids to take joy on the pretty pictures they created with their own hands. I personally viewed this as a success and waited for the next principal to come along. The DOE goes through principals like paper towels lol. So to all of you out there, just bide your time regarding observations, the will almost assuredly change in a year or two, they always do. Harharhar.

We used to have an administrator who would stop by our room for 5 to 10 minutes once a year. Then he would give us all glowing evaluations. The same glowing evaluation. Some of the time he would forget to change the name of the teacher! I miss those days!

I’m a HS student in Spanish 3 and we are all really funny, but one day the vice principal in the back of the room so a student stood at the door with a white board that said “act normal, the evaluation guy is in there” it may have been the most normal start to class we have ever had. (Today I came in to someone cutting teddy bears head off for a science project)

We traditionally had a group of teachers who got together for lunch on Fridays. One time we had lunch in my room and since I am in a portable we had a grill going cooking hamburgers. One of my administrators, who just so happens to show up to places that have food, came by and we gave him a burger then he left. He was there for a total of maybe 5 min. At the end of lunch, my email pings, and when I looked it was from the evaluation program. He had evaluated me! no students, during my lunch, and he evaluated me. It wasn't a bad evaluation, nor a great one, but it was funny that he even did this. Evaluations are a joke, just like you said. There has to be a better system. As a side note, I was in the military before I began teaching, and their system is no better.

When I taught at Public School briefly, I lost points on my evaluation because I had cardboard boxes on top of high shelves. Apparently, it looked ugly and so I had to be penalized for it. I also lost points because I worded the objective on the board incorrectly. In our written lesson plans, it had to be worded a certain way (ex. Students will use a graphic organizer to identify metaphors with 70 percent accuracy) but my administrator told me that I could word it in a kid friendly way in the classroom. So, I did. However, unfortunately, when it came time for that same administrator to evaluate me, she docked points for my doing exactly what she told me to do.

I work at multiple sites at my district, and got a few really rough evaluations from my admin at one site. I was told I didn’t have “full compliance” when a student blurted out a question because they were interested in the subject and wanted to know more about it. I thought I had a good lesson but it was marked a 2. Surprisingly enough, I got 3s and 4s from the other administrators in the district. There must have been some magic in my car that turned me into a better teacher as I drove across town.

I received two poor evaluations early in my teaching career, that you might fine funny. The first was I was a second year teacher. I was told in my pre conference that since I was in my second year I can only receive satisfactory at the highest. Even if I was teaching at a distinguished or proficient level. My evaluator said that those two levels are reserved for five year or higher teachers. So before she even set foot in my classroom she pretty much told me what I was going to get. Second, we have Google folders where we upload our lesson plans and tests. One folder in for tests and one for lesson plans. I was only given access to the lesson plan folder I told admin and they said not to worry about it. So I uploaded my tests and lesson plans to the same Google folder to cover my tracks. On the day of my evaluation I get an email giving me access to the tests folder. So I immediately uploaded all my tests for the year in that folder. My evaluation happens, great! They love my lesson. But I received a low score despite admin loving my lesson. When I looked to why I got a low score, "teacher only uploads tests and lesson plans to one google folder and neglects the other folder. Than on the day of the evaluation uploaded all his tests at once." For context admin apologized to me for not giving me access to the test folder. They said they "had no idea" and then they checked the multiple emails I sent them about this issue and realized it and corrected it.... And then penalized me for it. I only uploaded them on the day on the evaluation because that was the first day I had access to it!!!

God Bless ya! A lot of Illinois schools use the Charlotte Danielson Evaluation model. The person who created this isn't a teacher, has never been a teacher. Somewhere out there Charlotte's living the good life by making teachers and administrators miserable, but somehow Illinois keeps using it.

During my first couple of years within my teaching career, I received an observation/evaluation on the last day of school, while my high school students were taking their final exam. They gave me an above average score, indicating certain areas where I needed improvement. I then noticed my evaluation form was back dated a couple of months. I refused to sign off on my evaluation.

Evaluator said a boy wrote on a girl's leg cast during my lesson (lost points of course). Only I, as the regular teacher, knew that this boy was my best student and was listening regardless of whether he was writing on a leg cast. And how does that make me a better teacher to tell me that? This story is only the tip of the iceberg. That was my first and last year in the school system.

I was blessed with very kind principals who probably gave me better scores than I deserved. It was parent evaluations I feared the most. The worst ones coming either from parents who never even visited my classroom, or from parents who let their children walk all over them and didn't like the fact that I didn't allow them to walk all over me. That's one of many reasons why I will never go back to teaching full-time. It's not worth the stress. And, I realized the other day that I can make more money working at the new Taco Bell down the street. 😆

Here’s my current gripe: I’m a drama teacher. A drama classroom looks completely different than a science classroom. Assessment, classroom management, content delivery looks very different in both classes. We are required to make accommodations for our students, but where are the accommodations in evaluations? Personally, I think VETERAN teachers from the various departments should be the ones evaluating. More often than not, a veteran theatre teacher is going to know more of what to look for in my classroom.Those who are knowledgeable and trained in specific content areas should evaluate those teaching in that content area.

Evaluating an adult’s professional ability based on what a kiddo wants to do at that moment is ludicrous - justification comes from those who have either never been in the classroom or have been out of it for way too long.

Bruh. As a student learning to teach, I find that the best feedback is from the students. They have the most hands on experience with the teacher

I was a school music teacher for a few years and I was lucky if admin actually entered my room to evaluate me! During my FIRST YEAR TEACHING, no one watched me teach until the third quarter, a while after our Christmas concert. They said, "we can hear you down the hall" referring to the fact that the band/choir room was a few doors from the principal’s office. I think they meant, "no one was screaming or bleeding so everything must be fine". I was actually happy when they switched things up the following year and sent other teachers to fill out a form about us (things they liked, things we could improve, things they want to borrow or learn from us, etc) because we would actually get feedback and I got to watch a couple other teachers with some of my students! More informative than any "evaluating" I got my first year teaching…

1st year teaching 8th/9th science, the year after No Child Left Behind, so everyone was freaking out over the standardized tests. I was given a practice copy of the test and was told to use it to help the kids get ready. Turns out it was an illegal copy of the actual test. I was disgusted that I was made to cheat, felt like they had no confidence in my ability to teach. One of the many reasons my first year was my last.

People on the outside have no idea how screwed up teaching is. But the rest of us are like, "sounds familiar."

I'll always remember my principal walking into evaluate me. Sits down with his little Palm Pilot or whatever it was at the time. Then after sitting there for about 5 minutes he gets up and starts walking around the room. Looking at the supplies I have out in the posters I have up. Then he walks up to me in the middle of my lesson at the front of the classroom and asks me if the posters I have on the wall of verb charts are really helpful to my students.

This is only one of the reasons I left education. 9/10 my admin didn’t even come in and observe me and I would find my evaluation in my box in the office 😳

Agree with everything you say. I think they can’t think of any way to do it differently so nothing will change for us. If an administrator sees that you are testing, they need to tun around and leave. A different day would be a good choice. And that self-evaluation is a complete joke.

The Danielson Model - THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF EDUCATION OUT OF CONTROL. If you haven't seen this model of teacher evaluation, you will be shocked. It is sooooooooooooooooo detailed. It takes principals many, MANY HOURS to complete just one evaluation. It is INSANE.

There's no winning the game though; if you'd found a way to communicate with your students during a test, you'd have lost points for doing so.

I once got penalized on an evaluation (only 5 minutes at the end of class on a Friday before a long holiday weekend) for "not enforcing the dress code." When I asked for what specific violation had occurred, I was told a student was wearing sunglasses and I didn't make him take them off. I was flabbergasted, I had literally told a kid to remove their sunglasses the minute he first entered my class and he was the only sunglasses kid in class that day. So I asked for more clarification. Which student? The student I had interacted with. So I asked for more clarification, because he hadn't put them back on. Principal said "he were them the entire class period." He didn't. I asked, again for clarification. The Principal then put her own reading glasses on top of her head--much like a head band, not over the eyes at all, just pulling her hair back with the glasses. She said the student wore sunglasses the entire class... on top of his head not over his eyes and I was penalized for that, even though I had told the student to "take off the sunglasses" (which he did, he took them off his eyes and put them of his head). This was the same principal who previously lectured me about how I supposedly wrote too many pink slips for misbehavior and how I needed to "learn to pick your battles and not worry about the little things 'cause kids will be kids."

As a 34 year music teacher veteran I have to laugh because EVERY one of those evaluation types have happened to me! Mostly good evaluations til the last 5 years when I got a new YOUNG principal (I taught elementary level... he only had taught 10 years in 8th grade social studies 😒) anyway..... the first year he formally evaluated me we was the first self evaluation year. I, like you, was honest and humble about my abilities... not to mention it not my personality to boast even if I did a great job anyway. So, I got criticized because I evaluated myself lower than he thought I should have.... the next year I tried to be more positive and gave myself higher scores.... you guessed it..... he made some snarky comment about how my evaluation was too high..... thankfully most of the staff had a similar situation so it wasn’t just me, but geesh! Really.... what is the point of a self evaluation anyway.... they just really care what they think they know. Thankfully with COVID I decided it was time to hang up the teaching towel and retire. So glad I did with all the nightmares I’m hearing about in my building now. Thanks for all the laughs Devin! My hubby and I are now both retired music teachers and love your channel! Keep us laughing! Thank you!

My principal has been doing evaluations by asking the students. On every point. They determined whether our class was meeting state standards, whether every student was receiving appropriate differentiation. As far as I know, none of the kids who had differentiations were ever asked to evaluate. I don't get bonuses based on it, thankfully.

Just wow. It just floors me that ANY of these "dark side" people (aka Admin) were ever teachers, Devin. Not sure what district or state you taught, but you are certainly THAT teacher that I wish I'd had. I always tell my parents (I teach third grade) that we won't call home for a missed assignment or lunch left on the counter, but leaving one's sense of humor behind is a deal breaker in my classroom! Glad you are creating a different life for yourself, although it's a real crime that SO many students won't get to have you as part of their "stories." LOVE your content!!

Hang in there! That's the best advice I can give having spent nine years as an administrator and 11 years as a teacher. I believe the real problem with assessment and testing and curriculum lies at the federal and states departments of education. You get 30 something PhDs who have never been responsible for their own classroom, who write a dissertation gathering data from real teachers' students then from that create a new fangled way of getting information into small heads and convince policy makers that it will change the world of education. It always involves new curriculum and testing materials and training workshops that the 30 something PhD and the policy enforcers make millions off of. About every five years one of them gets lucky (adopted) and the rest of us get saddled with trying to implement something that doesn't even look good on paper (to a real teacher) let alone in a classroom. Spend 20 years in education and anticipate about four of these cycles. Smile and nod a lot. Check the boxes when you have to. But stay focused on what matters: Learning from and with your kids while you have as much fun together as possible.

I was given my unannounced observation right before my class left for a field trip. I was graded on lesson planning and instruction.... There were no lesson plans turned in from any kindergarten teacher that day because we were going to be out of the building all day, and for 30 minutes before we left for the field trip, I had to stop preparing for the trip and come up with a lesson on the fly so my principal could evaluate me. I got the worst scores I had ever received and that evaluation was used to put me on the improvement plan that ultimately ended in me being "asked to resign" because I had "made a lot progress but not enough"

Much respect, man. I taught Art and Social Studies for 3 years (private school)-- and worked as a sub part time for 5 years (public schools)--So I know how it is. I don't know how you and other teachers keep going.

I went in for a PDP (Professional Development Plan) meeting with my admin (a person who'd taught about 2 years of math in middle school-I'd taught HS English for 20+ years), her boss from Talent Management, and my union rep. This was a meeting to list and address all my "deficiencies," and list all the hoops I had to jump through to correct them. This admin had written so many PDPs that she got them mixed up and handed me another teacher's PDP form to sign. They were the same, but just had different names on them. I looked it over silently and handed it to my union rep. She looked it over silently, held it up, and ripped it in half in front of the admin and TM person. It was glorious!!!

Heads up to any newbie teachers...Have a lesson primed and ready (with worksheets) in your desk on content you've already taught. The second admin walks in, the teaching show begins. Man, I'd have primary students wanting to rip their arms off waving to answer questions. Admin swore I was amazing...Little did they know, it was a neatly crafted show ready to begin at drop off a hat, rehearsed and updated at select times throughout the year. Admin plays stupid games, you gotta play better.

Tying bonuses to test scores is a truly frightening thought. Frightening.

I knew a teacher who was asked why they didn’t post the “task intent criteria” on the board at the start of the lesson. They explained that this was the discrepant event stage of a series of learning experiences and they had built up a set of experiments that had the students thinking more and more deeply about applications of one concept so they were misled into trying to figure out how that idea applied when the experiment surprised them by not doing the expected thing. It was the disequilibrium which really got them talking and re trying and asking questions and testing theories out- creative scientific thinking. The admin was maybe feeling the real or imagined weight from above so they said they really preferred and expected in future that the T.I.C. Would be posted clearly on the board. Thankfully the teacher stood by their method as it was engaging, effective and was more like real life. There was no box for the admin to check for creative use of discrepant events, so the teacher wrote it in in their comments portion.

My personal favorite as a special Ed teacher was testing our very special needs kiddos on grade level. Yes you read correctly - a 10 year old with severe cognitive impairments who recognizes 15 lower case letter takes the 5th grade test.

Early 90s, Irving, TX middle school. Great principal. Knew how to treat teachers... came in during the first month of the school year, less than 10 min into call over the walkie a kid had broken his leg in PE, he leaves, never comes back. I get a high eval......best one ever.

New rule: evaluations from administrators unless their IQ higher than yours AND they can do your job better than you.

my fav story is the phone call "Because of your test scores we are taking away your honors classes and giving you all regular, also by the way will you teach an AP class - but if you do this you have to give up your planning." I was so confused after that phone call.

I teach English as a Second Language and I had an announced evaluation where the admin told me exactly what to say and do to get a high score. My wife also teaches ESL at a different school in our district and she told me to put examples and non-examples of completed student work in my PPT since it was a part of the rubric (basically an easy high score in a category). Anyway, the admin was late coming to my lesson and even after I restarted my lesson for her I still received a low score. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't good either. (My students even showed higher level thinking because they were asked why they would need the certain skill we were learning in real life.) It was one of better lessons I've had in my short career. When I asked why my score was low, I couldn't get an answer why it was. She just said she wrote what I said verbatim and just flipped through her notes while trailing off. She was in and out of my classroom in five minutes. I was beyond over it.

I totally hear you!! Principals should not be allowed to judge and critique your abilities until they have spent 2 full weeks with your exact student makeup completely alone with no help just like you are.

My last evaluation was a 3 out of 4. I asked my vice principal what he wanted me to improve. He said he had no suggestions for me. I said then why do I have a 3? He that he was teacher of the year at his former school and only had a 2.5. Then I said why were you teacher of the year?

My favorite is when them come in for the evaluation for 5-10 minutes. Then they dock you for not doing something that you actually did, but they were either not in the room yet or had already left when you did it.

During my last evaluation, a student completed their exit ticket, stood up, yelled to the class that they were done and then started offering to help others. I had made it very clear that this was an individual assignment and upon making eye contact with the student, they apologized and sat down. During this same evaluation, my students suddenly forgot where the turn-in basket was or what to do with their paper when they were done - the turn-in basket has been in the same place all year... How did I score...let's just say it was bad. My students have had 93% growth and improvement in reading over 6 months but that doesn't really matter because of this evaluation.

My mom taught World Geography and her vice principal came in to evaluate her lesson in October 1989. She decided to add current world events to the lesson and was teaching about the geography of the world series (it was being played between the SF and Oakland teams). He told her it was irrelevant, unnecessary and gave her negative scores for the whole thing. The Loma Prieta earthquake in the bay area was that night. It happened on live TV. Her students were excited when they came to class the next day because they understood what was going on. Her vice principal however....wouldn't even look at her.....for days.

I was marked down once for advancing a gifted student to the honors class -- the classwide test score average went down. That year, I also received a "needs improvement" for, ahem, "not having eyes in the back of my head." My students hadn't acted up; the admin just didn't feel that "teacher presence" from me.

This was 30 years ago, but I worked for one principal who, in the three years I was under him, came to observe me exactly once. He arrived, and I apologized, explaining to him that we were about to take a major exam that would last to the end of class. He said that's okay, he could learn a lot about me from my testing style. He sat in the back of the room, looked at the test for a minute or two, and then fell asleep. He slept through the entire class. The kids were great; no one woke him, and he was roused by the bell to go to the next period. That was literally the *only* time he was ever in my classroom.

During student teaching a professor from college observed. She didn't think I should have given a student pencil and paper to take notes with. Due to being in (definitely) not the wealthiest school, we were also taught maybe the kids couldn't afford supplies. My strategy was, as the student was a talker, I could redirect him to taking notes, instead of him interrupting. Second, he had no excuse at test time that he couldn't take notes that day. Considering how many years later I recall this...I would 100% do the same thing again. At the very least it showed the kid someone cared and he wasn't all on his own to figure it out.

I learned how hard it is to get accurate and effective evaluations while I was a senior in college as part of my psychology degree that I was getting along with my teaching certificate. To graduate, we had to do some kind of psychology experiment or study and write a thesis paper. So I thought, since I want to be a teacher, I'll do something about teachers. For part of my study, I observed teachers for 30 minutes and tallied how many times they did certain behaviors. The teachers also filled out surveys where they estimated how often they did certain things. What I found was that my observations had no correlation to the teachers' reported behaviors. But hallway through the year, I realized how impossible it would be to accurately observe the teachers, especially just from sitting in the classroom for 30 minutes. Accuracy would require hours of filming and then several people watching and coding all the behaviors seen in the recording which takes days because you have to slow down the recording. Multiple people would be need to watch the same recording to get more accuracy and less bias. And that's not even taking into account that you have to agree on what you should be looking for in the first place. Human behavior is so multifaceted. Anyway, waaaay beyond what a college senior could possibly do in two semesters. I ended up presenting my data but focused on the flaws and pitfalls of observations in evaluating teacher behavior and possible better methods for future research. A friend of mine studied wild duck behavior at the campus pond for his thesis. I was really jealous of him by the end of the year.

I taught in a school that was undergoing remodeling. On the day of my observation, they literally started drilling into my classroom wall from the outside (the only time this happened). I tried to power through, but you could barely hear anything. The lesson was designed so that we had to read, discuss a question, and write an answer. It wasn't going to work any other way as it was a complex lesson (we were supposed to be doing higher level learning with "common core" elements that could be interpreted by students in many different ways). My evaluator said she didn't like how I handled the situation, and that I should have just given them the questions and had them read on their own (even though I only had the questions on the projector since we were supposed to be doing them together). She even said it would have been ok for them to put in their earbuds and listen to music while they worked...as the deafening drill noise continued through the rest of the period. And I was absolutely certain if I had actually done this, she would have asked me why I let them put in earbuds during my lesson, which was strictly against school rules. (I can remember thinking she was going to go ask the construction workers to knock it off, at least for a few minutes. Instead she just packed up her computer and left. They didn't drill anymore during the school day, and I later found out they did tell them to stop the loudest noises during school hours.) Anyway, I was far enough into my career to know I was being jerked around. How the hell are you supposed to teach a lesson when construction workers are literally drilling into your room??? My evaluator said she could either do another observation, or she would have to mark in my eval that she did not approve of my handling of the situation. I told her I wasn't doing it over again. I had spent 4-5 hours preparing that lesson and I wasn't doing that again (only, surely, to be thrown under the bus for some other nonsense that I had no control over). ... In my first district, the maintenance workers would sometimes mow the lawn right outside our classroom windows during the school day. It was VERY loud, and would take an hour or so with the riding lawnmower. It was absolutely batsh*t crazy--yet I soon realized that teaching and learning was often not valued, recognized, or supported by ANYONE outside the classroom. (To this day, counselors, librarians, office staff, attendance secretaries, etc., often have NO IDEA what period it is when they call you...or what lunch it is, etc. I constantly have to say, "That student isn't here because I had them last period," or, "that student isn't here because this is second lunch.")

The first year I taught in Texas they developed a new teacher evaluation system. To test it they had five trained administrators evaluate a lesson taught by one teacher, all at the same time. The evaluations went from the lowest score possible to the highest. Later that year I was evaluated with that system. Although it was my first year teaching, I receive a near perfect score. The following year I was evaluated with the same system, by a different person, and received the lowest marks I have ever seen in 28 years of teaching. I was amazed at how bad a teacher I must have become in just one year.

I actually struggled with falling asleep in class. I had one teacher constantly kicking me out of class for it. When I was 30 was diagnosed with narcolepsy. Even getting that diagnosis was difficult. Thanks to a nurse practitioner who saw that there was something wrong that couldn’t be explained just by mental health treatment I was able to be referred to my father’s sleep doctor that treated him for his narcolepsy. Since both my father and I are when my son began falling asleep in class late in his Freshman we were able to address his condition quickly and he was able to finish his high school career with his teachers being willing to simply wake him up instead of punishing him for falling asleep.

I was preparing a class to read a story called, "The medicine bag". From previous experience i realized most students didn't know what a medicine bag was, so they didn't fully understand the story. I talked about the importance of the medicine bag in some native American cultures for maybe 5 minutes. I was told not to teach social studies in the language arts class.

In NH we are working on competency based assessments and grading for our students. We tell students and families that while there is a “meets competency” score and “exceeds competency” it’s important for them to recognize that “exceeds” is not the expected or nor is it always possible to reach depending on which competency it is. However, teachers have a similar rubric and if you are “meeting” all expectations you aren’t doing enough. For real, we are doing everything we are required to do but are told we need to do more.

I remember one time my first year teaching receiving a walk-through evaluation. It was an honors Algebra I class, and a student asked a question that was a little beyond where we were at the time, but it was a good critical thinking question that was very relevant, so I went to answer it. I was mid-explanation when the evaluator entered, and when I received my score, I noticed she had left a comment that I lost points because I wasn't adhering to the curriculum for the day. Ay ay ay

my first evaluation ---- EVER ---- as pretty much a warm breathing body with enough qualifications to be hired to teach at a private school (Just one year, I said, I can do anything for a year..... that was 2000..... and I'm still teaching high school).... the evaluator came into my class that had ONE student. One. A single student. Private high school. largest class (that I also taught, and was the largest in their entire history as an institution had 13 kids). But this evaluation was me teaching a class of one. And there's something magical about teaching a single student. You learn what that student needs, you tailor everything to her needs. You teach her the way she needs to learn. The evaluator walked into the room, and I was teaching this 17 year old about inequalities. She told me, before the evaluator walked in, that she never understood inequalities. So I found a way to help her. In comes Ms. Shellnut while we were discussing how the alligator inequality symbol consumes the big meal. After Ms. Nutcase leaves, student tells me "I didn't ever understand it, but now it makes sense!" (she went on to be a lawyer).... six weeks later I get my evaluation, my first ever evaluation, as someone they hired at 4 pm on Friday before school started Monday, who had never taught kids before, stated that Ms. Fruitloop had never seen a more PUTRID example of instruction in her 40 years of teaching. (yeah, 40). Luckily for 23 years of high school math students, I was unfazed by the eval. Of course, then there was the evaluation I received in 2016 after moving to a new high school, new state, etc. They had an elaborate "create a portfolio to prove you have done all of these 48 things at the meets-or-exceeds level" and I spent the 50 hours or so to put that together, and I could measure where I should be based on the portfolio (Meets, not quite exceeds)..... and the principal looks at all the evidence, and says, "when I evaluated you the first time, you were at approaching, not meeting the standard, so that's your score" In other words, she didn't care about the evidence, she only cared about the score she wanted to give me. That was the moment I stopped caring. I keep thinking (wistfully) "maybe they'll fire me?" but they never do. Just because I'm a math teacher in a super rural area that would need to import a math teacher from hundreds of miles away if they really needed to replace me.

Taught in Hillsborough county Florida. They had too many teachers scoring the highest possible score, so the district told the administrators to lower the scores so only a couple teachers scored high.

Canadian teacher brain stopped working. Evaluations can be brutal if you have an out of touch career-rising principal, don't get me wrong. But the levels you are describing here are crazy af!

The last evaluation I ever had before leaving that god-forsaken profession, I was marked unsatisfactory because I was "too accommodating to administrator requests." No explanation.

I had a friend (early 20s female) who was evaluated by our administrator, who had repeatedly made inappropriate remarks (I witnessed this) and physically touched her in ways that made her feel uncomfortable on multiple occasions. She was really nervous about her evaluation because, in our state, probationary teachers basically have to have 3 out of 5 years in which they receive effective or highly effective evaluations in order to progress in their certification. Even though her state standardized test scores were higher than mine in the same subject area (I know this because I helped her compile her data for her evaluation presentation), she got a lower evaluation score than I did because she "lacked confidence." Right before I submitted my resignation to the superintendent, I pointed out how flawed the evaluation system in our district was and asked him to think about how confident he would feel if someone who had been making unwanted advances were evaluating him.

I love your videos - they are 💯 I taught elementary PE for nearly 30 years. In my state I was a “class B” teacher - meaning that my subject did not impact test scores. However, my yearly evaluation was based on school test scores. One year I was rated “minimally effective” and put on a growth plan because of my school’s test scores. The following year I was evaluated on test scores from PE tests given to my students. As a result, I was rated as “highly effective” and then put on a watch list because teachers aren’t supposed to be able to move from “minimally effective” to “highly effective.” My suggestion: evaluate teachers based on what they actually teach - and how they teach. I was ALWAYS evaluated with criteria used for classroom teachers. Fun fact - Teachers and students things differently in PE than in the classroom. 🤔

For years on the day of someone coming in to evaluate my class, I showed a movie. Somewhere is on a timeline of five years and administrator mentioned this occurrence. I told him he was a very observant.

I never got anything good from admin observations. However, we did peer observations one year and that was some of the best feedback ever. I enjoyed getting to watch other teachers, and I appreciated their advice after viewing my classes since I knew that they had to handle the same students and were therefore speaking from a place of practical and personal experience. I also got great advice from a curriculum coach who was freaking awesome- she would literally spend months coaching new teachers through tried-and-true techniques for everything from lesson planning to classroom management. Of course, after she retired, they hired some dingdong who likes to sit in her office all day and takes two weeks of “sick” leave to visit Disney world. I’m not sure how to fix the system. For good teachers, I feel like peer observations and curriculum coaches are all you need- good teachers want feedback and will improve on their own, if given the chance and help to do so. Truly bad teachers (the ones that don’t care, show up hung over, only play extended edition of LOTR in math class, etc) won’t improve at all, even under pressure, so I guess evaluations are a way for admin to justify letting them go? But if that’s true, why does it take a sex abuse scandal, the teacher getting arrested in the parking lot, and a social media storm before those teachers get fired?

One of my principals kept an observation to 10 minutes, gave me a few compliments and a single suggestion of how to do it better. That was it. At another school we peer-evaluated. Teachers who taught a similar grade or subject would observe your classroom and give you some feedback, and then you'd do their evaluation. That should happen more often because they get it and can see what's working and offer sincere support.

I really have never cared what the results of my evaluation were. I will admit I would prefer a positive one, but only slightly, because quite often the person evaluating me did not have my respect. It reminds me of something that I read once that said: Who are these people by whom you wish to be admired? Are these not the same people you generally regard as fools and idiots? What is it when you wish then, to be admired by fools and idiots?

My admin waited for one of my formal evals until the last week of school, then she got called away in the middle of the lesson and a different evaluator had to come in even later in the week to do the eval.

It’s so subjective my AP hated me for no reason but liked the older ladies LOL

All of the above can help. A little self-evaluation, a little observation by multiple people in multiple scenarios, PLUS parent and student evaluations should play a part. They see us for 180 days and have a pretty good idea of what makes a good and bad teacher.

I must say, I have never ever had evaluation drama. In general all the administrators I’ve worked for have thought that the evaluation was as much bullshit as I thought the evaluation was and they walked in they said I really don’t need to do this and they handed me a paper with all outstanding‘s and I signed it. I’m just an average teacher. But all the administrators I’ve had knew that the game was rigged. I did have one administrator who told me that if he gives all outstandings to everybody then he gets in trouble from the district. So he would ask me which of these different categories do you think I can mark good job rather than outstanding. So we negotiated and made an evaluation form that looked realistic.

Homeschooler Mom here, who still cares about good teachers. Take that leap of faith in yourself and get the hell out. Live your best life as a Education Enhancer.

I was evaluated on a day when the class was great, my lesson was great. Things were amazing. But the principle didn't want me back the next year, so the eval was written to show that I was incompetent so they could use that to let me go. I ended up in a better school with very low class sizes. Unfortunately it was $25K per year decrease in pay. But when distance learning happened I was so glad not to be at that school anymore. (they did hybrid). Oh yeah, I refused to sign the eval because I didn't agree. They said that meant nothing. And the blessed Union didn't do anything to help. I will never give a union another dollar of my pay.

I was given a series of terrible evals where I was given poor marks for doing the things in my classroom my principal told me to do. He was the one evaluating me. Rural American community I am a former scientist who taught Biology through the pandemic. Needless to say I was not the most popular person with parents. This year is his first year as principal and I'm up for contract. After he publishes the eval where he said there was no learning going on in my classroom. I met with him, our Dean of Students, and my union rep and asked one simple question. I showed them a graph of my state test scores (Bio is a state tested score where I live and as someone who actually did that job I can say ours is actually a pretty good set of standards for the subject) my scores go up every year from the year I started (I replaced a woman halfway thought the year who was letting her students play fortnite in class because she thought they were making the game not playing it). Last year I had the third highest scores in our district (3% higher and I would be 2nd). Anyway I asked how both things can be true when I am not teaching to the test but instead giving them a real class with labs and real science outdoors (before he stopped allowing me to do those without advance approval). He says the test represents one day. I responded that it was one day for 70(ish) students every year that is the culmination of a year's worth of training to think like scientists. I was told that the community doesn't give a crap about test scores anyway, he knows what good teaching looks like. Needless to say his job became VERY secure when they announced my replacement for next year. It is their football coach who was previously driving in from out of state. Anyone looking to hire a real Biology teacher? Small school so I was the only HS science teacher so I was also teaching Envi Sci, Physics, Chem, Freshmen Physical Science, & PreEngineering. I also did all my own curriculum mapping because none existed. Real self starter. I don't coach football though so I might not be what your community wants in a Biology teacher.

I just resigned yesterday! No joke! 😆🤪🙌🏼

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The drop in evaluations are THE WORST. The school I was at it felt more like bullying than actually helping us get better at teaching. They would record teachers on their phones and then play it back to us during our weekly meetings. I had one admin leave her phone with a student to record me ( I took the phone from the student and deleted the recording.) If you have ever been in a high school classroom as a new teacher it takes only 1 student to make the whole thing fall apart and instead of helping us control the classroom they just made us feel guilty for not having the classroom management skills of a 10 year teacher.

Admins are usually educrats who love students so much that they COULD NOT WAIT to get their admin cert and get out of the classroom and away from students. I taught HS science for 23 years. The last year my evaluator was a brand new baby AP who had maybe 3 years experience teaching middle school art. She was a first ballot hall of fame idiot. It irked me having her pass judgment on my AP Biology lesson on carbohydrates, fats, and proteins and their role in the cell. ("When will your kiddos ever need to use this IRL?" - um, seriously...? Some of them want to be doctors, most of them are going to eat at some point...) She even said I should not use the word "fat" to describe lipid compounds in cells since she was offended by that word and felt it might shame some students. When she gave me my written eval to review, I circled three spelling errors and pushed it back across the table and said "sorry, that's just a teacher habit." (She used "tenant" instead of "tenet", used "it's" as a possessive, and spelled "lipid" with two p's). Also, any grown up who refers to HS students as 'kiddos' and says 'IRL' like it is a word is an even bigger idiot.

evaluations kept me from teaching. College professor didn't like me in the last semester, which was student teaching, told me to change majors, now I don't have to worry about masking up when I teach

During my 1st year of teaching, my principal came in to do an observation of my class. Except about 5 minutes into the period, he FELL ASLEEP! I mean, knocked out! This happened both times he did an observation of my class.

I agree that the evaluations are extremely subjective. I was an alternative teacher cert, so my first year I had the alternative program evaluate me 3 times and then my admin did an additional eval. I was penalized on my first evaluation for not using enough technology during the lesson as well as other minor infractions. I was told verbally to keep doing what I’m doing and that students were very engaged, but on paper rated very low at “needs improvement”. I asked about the differences and was told that as an alternative cert, they have to show that I am making improvement in the program throughout the year, so nobody gets a good score the first eval…. The second time I was evaluated, I did much worse. I was sick, the lesson just wasn’t as well prepped, however I scored higher because the evaluator needed to show I was making improvement… Finally after teaching for 3 years at one district, I move to another districted. The previous two years eval, I was rated distinguished in almost every category or 5/5. This year with a different admin, same teaching style, I was rated with 2/5 or developing in most area. I took notes in post conference on what needed to be improved. Turns out I was docked for things like “not taking data” though I explained that I had a huge data notebook and had several data entries from that day in class, but didn’t stop mid lesson to write in the book in front of her… so she scored it as if I had taken none at all. I also brought up that I was pretty surprised by the scores as previously, as I had always scored high in many of the areas I scored the worst. My administrator kindly explained that she grades more objectively and has to be held accountable from her scores so she can’t just go around handing out high scores (aka I probably didn’t earn the previous high scores I was given). She went in to say she was certain I would perform better in the future as I came to learn their high expectations. The irony is that this new school that rated my teaching so poorly was rated at a C overall, but my previous school was rated as an A. I’ll be going back there next year thankfully.

Here in Indiana, one year they scheduled the IRead test, which is an extremely important reading exam, that determines whether third graders go on to the next grade or require summer school, for the very day that the time changed. Which meant that the kids had lost an hour of sleep the night before the most important test of the entire year. 🙄

I have been retired for 20 years. Except for the virtual learning nightmare, everything is exactly the same as it was when I left in 2002. It's amazing that our experiences, thoughts, complaints are so identical across the U.S. Teachers are fighting the same battles today as I did in the 1980s and 90s--low pay, duty, parents, testing, staff development, evaluations, administration on and on and on. Are you sure you didn't teach 35years ago at my school?

This past academic school year (2022), I was actually evaluated (walk-thru) on the day of a classroom party, of which we were told ahead of time we could plan to have with our students. Everything planned for the day was meant to be easy and fun, not a lot of intense instruction…sigh… Elementary school - Valentine’s Day Party, yep! 😑😑

I had a principal walk in to do my observation on the last day of school.

That test one is bs. If my supervisor ever walks into my class and sees I'm giving a test, she immediately leaves and comes back another day.

I was at a school in which I taught 2 levels of social studies in one section, then taught 2 levels of math the following block. As an experienced teacher trying to cover double the curriculum an hour I had one group work on their laptops while I taught the other then switched. I got called into the dreaded principal's office. I was put on a 2 week probationary status because I was allowing the kids to be on their computers too much and I was relying on Google Classroom to manage assignments and lecture videos. I was in the terrible state of not knowing how else to maintain my sanity and teach 2 classes at once and the principal stood outside my door listening to see if the students were on their computers or not. So I did what any rational single parent of 2 would do; I quit. Joke was on our Ms Trunchbull, this was October of 2019.

Evaluate teachers based on their subscription count. As a reminder if you’re reading this don’t forget to hit that subscribe button and click that bell. Also check out the merch shop in the description…. Hope this helps.

Maybe it's time to have all classes permanently on line only

I am a retired college adjunct. I taught a computer class that covered everything from how the computer processes things to Microsoft Excel, Word, and PowerPoint. Several years ago, I was observed by my assistant dean who sat through an Excel lesson. I was working from the instructor's computer and my instructor screen was projected up onto a big screen in the front of the classroom so the students could follow along with what I was doing on their own computers. Overall, my evaluation score was pretty good, except my asst. dean commented that I should have gotten up and walked around the classroom more while teaching the lesson...the Excel lesson...on the computer... Guess I should have strapped my computer to my hip or something. *sigh*

Yep... I had a walkthrough where the admin came in halfway through the lesson. He stayed for about 15 minutes and left. I got a zero on the technology use part. Oh I had the students use technology... but it was before he came in the room! When we had the TAP program I was a master teacher and did observations. I would have never scored a teacher that way. Before I went in I had looked at their lesson plans so knew what part of the lesson I would see and that is all I scored.

Love ur content Devin. Enlightening. Subbed.

Right on, man!

Same here in the UK. It’s gone beyond a joke.

Yeah it's bad in the UK too, GCSES are exams done over a 4 week period (but with a half term in the middle) that for some students contains around 25 exams. These are the only exams that dictate how well they did in the entirety of secondary school (11-18) and hence teachers are partially evaluated on their classes results. This means that if for example OCR (who make the exam) mess up and write questions with no real correct answer and stuff not on the spec (curriculum map) this means that out of the 2 exams the students do that dictate how good they are at computer science 1 they did not do well in meaning if the grade boundaries (what dictates what is a 9,8,7,6,5,4 (A**,A*,A,B,C)) aren't rock bottom my entire class are likely to fail. 1 student who is predicted a 9 (the highest grade you can get in this subject and equivalent to an A**) not believing he'll pass the subject. Not only does it make me look bad against predicted grades (that are useless as based on maths and English tests from when year 6 (grade 5) it leads people to complain to our head(principal) that the teachers did not teach them the curriculum.

I remember having an admin who always liked to evaluate during 2nd period, which happened to be Creative Writing. So for months my evaluations weren’t based on any of my 11th Grade English classes, or AP Language and Composition. Head of department eventually convinced them to vary which periods were evaluated.

You tell stories that are exactly what I experienced teaching math for 11 years. Except, in Alaska, the kids are let’s say, um, distrusting of any sort of authority. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. I am guilty of it myself.

You pretty much nailed it! Also, I got marked down on an evaluation for having students read...yes, you read that correctly!

There was a time when I had thought of being a history teacher or something similar; yeah that's all gone now. But I sincerely appreciate the honesty on this channel Plus the district here has changed attendance and grading methods so that if you can fog a mirror you'll graduate.

Ah, T-tess, where an outstanding teacher gets a "C".