Comparison of perceptions of private school administrators and teachers on selected methods of teacher evaluation

Sound evaluation of education personnel is linked to effective teacher practices. Private schools are taking an increasing responsibility for schooling the nation's youth. Presently, there is no formal statewide teacher evaluation program in the private school sector. To assist in the development of an evaluation program, this study investigated the perceptions of private school administrators and teachers on selected methods of teacher evaluation. Private school administrators' perceptions of evaluation methods are important since their views can influence the methods they accept. Teachers' perceptions of evaluation methods are important since their views influence their levels of support for the total system. The sample of this study consisted of personnel from private schools in Broward and Palm Beach Counties accredited by the Florida Council of Independent Schools. These educators expressed their opinion of nine selected methods of assessment of teaching effectiveness. A survey was taken of the perceptions of the two groups. Each administrator and teacher was asked to rate the level of agreement of how accurate she/he believed the method of evaluation was in assessing the effectiveness of teaching. Teachers and administrators were divided into independent groups by the variable "position." Data analysis was done to reflect differences in the attitudes of teachers and administrators toward certain methods of evaluation. A.05 alpha level of significance was used. Responses to the survey indicated that respondents were essentially neutral. The average response among the administrators and teachers tended to be close to three on a 1 (strongly agree) to 5 (strongly disagree) scale. This reflected the level of agreement or disagreement on the accuracy of each method as an assessment tool of effective teaching for all items on the questionnaire. An independent samples t-test was used to compare means of each variable across the independent groups. Results indicated that the null hypotheses, which stated that there were no significant differences in the way each group perceived nine selected methods of teacher evaluation (p >.05), could not be rejected. Suggestions for future research include a replication of this study using a larger sample as well as including the variables of gender, experience, and grade level. Implementation of inservice workshops that prepare private school administrators to evaluate teachers is also recommended. Such programs would improve the evaluation skills of administrators. Teacher participation in the development of an evaluation program in the private school system is also recommended. This study also showed that 5.9% of the teacher sample were never evaluated. Another 28.4% were evaluated only once a year. This investigation further demonstrated the fact that 17.6% of the teacher sample were not certified to teach and 1% did not have a college degree.