Assessment & Accountability

Just a brief thought - back here I'd talked about ways to get better teachers through better training and better retention. I think accountability is important... honestly, not so much because teachers need to be babysat as because I think it is tremendously rewarding... and even RELIEVING... to have some of objective(ish) measure to determine whether what you're doing is working or not. I mean, I don't like being told I'm screwing up, but if I am screwing up ANYWAY, then for goodness sake, I want to KNOW! (And if you can tell me how to fitzit, pleasepleaseplease do, yanno?!)

Anyway, I think that good testing is our friend. An even better friend would be good testing that is tracked over the years. This might smooth out some of the objections to merit bonuses - that teachers who got higher-level students would have an edge.

I could be wrong. What do you think?