The Math Mistake

I am about to recover some earlier posts on an evaluation. Apparently, all is now well. What does that mean exactly? It means the math mistake that put my colleague in remediation with the possibility of being fired has now been corrected. She no longer needs remediation. I suggest reading the earlier posts from March 3rd and 5th on this topic.

Eduhonesty: Teachers, has your evaluation been determined by a mathematical formula using multiple inputs? Are you unhappy with your final average? Check the math. The people who screwed up my paycheck at least twice this year and my days off at least once may well be the same people who determined my final average for my evaluation. I have not checked my average. I surely would not bet my future on this number, though.

I know at least one teacher whose number was not merely wrong — it was frighteningly wrong. If my colleague had not squawked, that number would still be wrong. She would be in needless remediation.

To any undervalued teachers out there: Check the math. In Illinois, at least some evaluations from the Charlotte Danielson rubric are running over twenty pages. That’s a lot of room to slip a digit somewhere. That’s a lot of mathematics that can be undone by one or more simple typos. Santa may check his list twice, but I would not trust my school district to check anything twice. Or to check anything at all.