Thanks for writing this thoughtful and considered post in response to the one I wrote. I feel the same way… it amazes me that there are so few checks and balances in our system. In the past 5 years at my current school I’ve never had anyone sit down with me to look at what I’m doing, assess whether I’m doing a good job, or offer assistance or suggestions on how to do it better. I’ve raised it a few times with the Powers That Be, just to make sure I wasn’t missing something important, but no, those processes are simply not in place (although thankfully that’s changing as of this year). My previous school of 5 years also had no such evaluations in place either. The school I was at for 9 years before that also had nothing in place. Nor did the school before that, or the school before that, or the school I taught at on exchange… That covers nearly 25 years of teaching in the public, catholic and independent sectors, in two countries, and never have I had anyone step into my classroom to look at what I was doing or whether I was doing it well, or offer suggestions on doing it better.

For Richard (commenter on the original post) to say that incompetent teachers are a myth and don’t exist is just ridiculous. He suggest that the answer is professional development and training.  That would be fine if those teachers (and let’s be clear, it’s a very small percentage of the them) were at all interested in improving, but there are some I’ve met who simply are not.  It’s not that they don’t get training or have access to PD… they simply believe that the way they’ve always done things is the best way and they are content to repeat it unquestioningly year after year. They find new processes, research and technologies emerge, but none of these things have any effect on what they do, because they create a level of discomfort and resistance to change.  And if no one ever evaluates their performance or offers feedback on how to teach better, then why should they change?

The question is not whether all teachers are perfect at their job… let’s be honest, none of us are perfect. The problem is that some of them are simply not interested in learning and improving and changing and getting better at what they do, or thinking critically and reflectively about their own abilities. 

Whenever I say things like this I get accused of “teacher bashing”. Rubbish.  Calling for greater accountability and professionalism is not teacher bashing.  It’s simply stating that I’ve observed a very small minority of our profession who do not seem to be as concerned with improving and growing as they should be. I am well aware that there are many caring, thoughtful, reflective educators out there who are deeply aware of the need to learn and grow, and clearly I’m not directing any of this criticism towards them.