With the Enterprise City Schools’ Superintendent’s annual performance evaluation, due in January, still pending, the Enterprise Board of Education opted to contract with the Alabama Association of School Boards to conduct the evaluation.
While school boards are not required by law to conduct an annual evaluation of the superintendent, AASB strongly recommends it, Susan Salter explained.
Salter, AASB Director of Leadership Development, met with the EBOE to outline the tools and services that AASB has available to conduct a superintendent’s evaluation.
The meeting served both as mandated full-board training and as an information-gathering tool.
“As with any evaluation, the goal is to provide feedback to the superintendent about where the board is pleased with his/her work and where the board would like to see changes made,” Salter said. “Ideally, the board and superintendent have ongoing conversations through the year so that the results of the evaluation confirm what the superintendent already knows.
“But the evaluation also provides a vehicle for having those conversations,” Salter added.
AASB has developed a series of superintendent evaluation instruments that school boards have the option of using, Salter said.
One option is called a “Board Instrument,” which is an online tool in which each board member rates the superintendent’s performance on a five-point scale, Salter said, adding that unsatisfactory equals a 1, needs improvement equals a 2, meets expectations equals a 3, above average equals a 4 and demonstrates excellence equals a 5.
The instrument has 47 indicators divided across 10 categories. The board assesses the superintendent’s performance in communication, personnel management, educational leadership, financial management and leadership among other things.
A second option is called a “Direct Report Instrument” which is an online tool sent to the principals and the administrators who report to the superintendent. It uses the same rating scale and covers 30 indicators. The indicators address leadership, communication, collaboration, decision-making and management skills.
A third option is called a “Stakeholder Instrument,” which is an online tool that goes to people who, because of their positions, are likely to have interacted with the superintendent over the last year. These people include Parent Teacher Organization presidents, municipal officials and chamber of commerce leaders. The stakeholder instrument uses the same rating scale and has 14 indicators that cover items related to communication, leadership, problem solving, etc.
Salter said that AASB emails a link to the appropriate instrument. “When the evaluation is complete, we analyze the results, identify areas of strength and areas for potential growth and develop a detailed report to be given to the board and superintendent at a board meeting or work session,” she said.
Those online surveys are completely anonymous, said Salter. They have to be completed by April 14. “That survey is completely anonymous. In fact, close to the deadline, I will email all the invited participants and remind them of the deadline and ask them to complete their instrument if they have not yet done so,” Salter said,“because I have no way of only notifying the people who haven’t yet done it.”
Friday, April 8, was a teacher in-service day—a day students do not attend school but the staff are required to attend for training purposes. Teachers were asked to complete an “Enterprise City Schools Teacher Morale Feedback” survey April 8.
“We value your opinion as a teacher, school partner, and participant in continuous school improvement,” read the survey introduction. “In order for your voice to be heard in creating a positive district and school culture, we ask you to please take a few minutes to answer the following questions.”
Billed as an anonymous survey, the first three questions asked the teacher to name the school they currently teach at, name the grade in which they teach and cite how many years of teaching experience they have.
Salter said Tuesday that the teacher morale survey was not part of the AASB superintendent evaluation survey. “The timing was apparently a coincidence,” she said.
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3 comments:
JB posted at 6:58 am on Thu, Apr 14, 2016.
Teachers and others who work directly with our children should have a voice in this evaluation. They are the ones implementing the superintendent's initiatives.
Ronnie Donaldson posted at 9:22 pm on Tue, Apr 12, 2016.
Glad after all these years you are now interested in how the Superintendent is evaluated. I like this unbiased method as to what occurred when Morgan and Reese were in the job. Their buds friend and consulting partner were hired to the evaluation and they ALWAYS were rated superior which I had much misgivings along with many other citizens. All you need to do is find out who and how did the evaluation. Mr Vickers and Mr Phares are aware of this. Mrs. Man is also aware. This is the first time there has been a true evaluation. I am really pleased!
elbagirl posted at 7:45 pm on Tue, Apr 12, 2016.
Dr, Wright is a top down leader & she needs to go away. She has hired an unbelievable number of people making over $100,000.00 a year in the central office. She & her central office staff enjoy intimidating the teachers & making them feel that they are terrible educators. I have never seen such micro-managers!This is so sad! I wish someone would help us!