JEFFERSON — The Jefferson City Schools Board of Education wants to make sure that everything in the system is up to date, and that includes the tool used to evaluate the superintendent.
Although no decisions have been made yet, the group recently invited a representative from the Georgia School Boards Association to discuss the newer evaluation models being used around the state.
"The law says that the superintendent should be evaluated annually by the school board. However it doesn’t prescribe what should be used for the evaluation," said Tony Arasi, GSBA director of professional development.
"Most systems around the state use a checklist evaluation that has scores from one to five. It’s not a bad system, but there is one problem with that method: What is a one and what is a five? That particular model leaves a lot of room for disparity."
The Jefferson board currently used the numeric evaluation model, but members are open to changing that system.
"We’ve being doing the same kind of evaluation for a very long time, and so we think it’s time to update that," School Board Chairman Ron Hopkins said.
There are two main models that the GSBA recommend to school systems that are looking to update their evaluation practices. However, systems are not required to use either.
The first option aligns the
evaluation with GSBA standards. There are eight goals related to the state association standards and a list of indicators that outline how the goal should be achieved. Although the majority of the first model already is written by the GSBA, the third step of the evaluation lets school boards come up with a set of criteria for each goal used to determine if the specific requirement was met.
"The good news with this option is that boards can change the language of (this model) and although there are eight goals, we don’t recommend that boards use all eight goals because having too many goals is the same as not having any," Arasi said.
"Especially on the first year that a board utilizes a new model, we recommend that they start out with just a few goals. The superintendent is still responsible for overseeing the entire school system, but this gives them a few areas to focus on."
An example of a GSBA goal is that the superintendent "will provide leadership to the board of education in policy development and policy implementation."
The second option follows the same basic format as the first one — goals, indicators and evidence — but individual school boards come up with all of the language for the document.
"Most school systems with this option have goals about student achievement, attracting and retaining highly qualified staff and efficient use of resources," Arasi said.
"We don’t care which model you use. However, the second option isn’t recommended for schools systems with new superintendents because school boards haven’t had the opportunity to see them in action to determine strong and weak areas in performance."
With the newer models, instead of being graded on a numeric system, the superintendent is judged on whether or not he or she met the specified goal.
"One of the biggest things to remember here is that a ‘no’ isn’t necessarily a bad thing. You could have a no, but in the comments still say that significant progress was made," said Arasi. "So although the goal wasn’t met, you could still decide that the superintendent’s performance was satisfactory."
Both models include a feature unique to education: The employee being evaluated can give input into how he or she should be evaluated.
"We like to use a team approach. We think the discussions between the board and the superintendent are very powerful," Arasi said.
"A lot of times, it’s the superintendent who can make the best suggestions about what the system can do better and how the system can challenge itself. And although the superintendent can make suggestions, ultimately it’s still the board of education that has the power to approve the final document."