Teacher Appraisal

It would appear that there is a shift happening in Teacher Appraisal with a section in this year's budget being devoted to something called a Quality Teacher Programme. The details set out a programme that aims to lift the quality of teaching and strengthen the teaching profession. 
This is what the budget statement looks like.

The Quality Teaching Agenda is a package of interconnected initiatives designed to lift the 

quality of teaching and strengthen the teaching profession. The Quality Teaching Agenda will 

be progressed by the following activities over the period of this plan:

• support the transition to a more effective professional body for teachers as identified in the recent Ministerial review of the New Zealand Teachers Council

• lift the entry standards and quality of initial teacher education, including Māori medium programmes, the quality of practicum support for trainee teachers and coaching and mentoring for beginning teachers

• improve principal and teacher appraisal linked to professional learning and development opportunities through a focus on evidence-based approaches and the provision of targeted intervention and support for principals, teachers and schools

• develop a framework for promoting and supporting potential professional leaders of teaching practice

• implement a strategy to strengthen the value and raise the status of teaching by exploring the nature of teaching in the 21st century. This strategy will also deliver a sustained, more effective approach to teacher supply issues while increasing diversity in the profession

• implement and support the use of PACT (Progress and Consistency Tool) in schools

 Implicit in this is the feeling that the quality of teaching needs improving and that we are not as professional as we could be. Political statements for sure but obviously we will need to be aware of this and explore how we can make this work for us. It is obvious that we are going to have to take responsibility for gathering and storing the evidence that  supports and informs our appraisal as teachers. This evidence will need to be assessed against the 12 Registered Teacher Criteria. An example of this is one teacher's blog where she has linked posts about her teaching practice and thinking to each of the criteria that applies to that practice. This could work well as a professional and structured way of exhibiting our learning and development as well as the showing the good teaching and learning that is happening in our class. Now it is just a matter of getting started.