“Teacher evaluation in this country is fundamentally broken”

– US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan

Quoted in Education Week (subscription)

Secretary Duncan continues, “…teacher evaluation is divorced largely from student progress, student success, how do you defend that?”

Here in Kentucky no teacher has ever lost a license due to fundamental inability to teach. Not one. Unless they commit a crime, it is impossible to get rid of teachers who simply don’t do the job.

Education Week also points out that, “…the administration still places a major value on merit pay, saying that the federal Teacher Incentive Fund, which gives grants to school districts for performance-pay programs, was ‘the best thing the previous administration’ did.”

I don’t think any of that money worked its way to Kentucky, because our union-dominated public school system doesn’t have merit pay programs.

It remains to be seen if pressure from Washington will finally trump the teachers' union's lock on Kentucky schools, but it certainly looks like Secretary Duncan intends to try.