By Kaitlyn Kanzler, Special Writer
CRANBURY — The new teacher evaluation process was presented to the Board of Education at its Sept. 11 meeting.
According to Chief School Administrator Susan Genco, the board budgeted proactively last year to support teacher evaluation legislation in order to train the teachers and administrators as well as purchase education software to support the teachers.
The Teach New Jersey Act was signed into law by Gov. Chris Christie on Aug. 6 and aims to increase student academic performance by increasing teacher and administrator accountability for student achievement through a more rigorous evaluation process, according to Dr. Genco.
”Teacher evaluation has been on the horizon for a while,” Dr. Genco said.
According to Dr. Genco, the goals for the teacher evaluation system are to increase student achievement, accurately assess teacher effectiveness so teachers can get meaningful feedback.
It is also designed to support the ongoing improvement of all educators and ensure appropriate training, Dr. Genco said.
”We want to create a learning environment for teachers that is open to questions, open to sharing, and building trust so that the goal of student learning is always at the forefront,” Dr. Genco said.
As part of the New Jersey Department of Education’s Excellent Education for New Jersey, the district is required meet certain project requirements.
Administrators will receive 15 hours of training; have seven hours of practice evaluations, and seven hours for a proficiency test to certify that they are able to properly give evaluations, according to Dr. Genco.
”Our focus in Cranbury is going to be very proactive on teacher training and effectiveness and what good instructional practice looks like and how it relates to student learning,” Dr. Genco said.
According to Dr. Genco, there were 13 participating districts for the teacher evaluation process that tried out five different pilot programs. A district is able to create its own model as long as it meets the NJDOE’s requirements for evaluation.
Eight of the initial 13 districts chose the Charlotte Danielson model, with both Pennsylvania and New York adopting it as the state model.
The Cranbury School District also chose this model based on several different factors and according to Dr. Genco, the district has already been working with the Danielson model for six years.
”One of the nice things about Danielson is that it provides multiple forms of discussion for good teaching,” Dr. Genco said.
According to Dr. Genco, there are four domains and 22 components of the Danielson framework using a layered approach.
Dominion one encompasses planning and preparation, dominion two is the classroom environment, dominion three is instruction, and dominion four is professional responsibilities.
The next step for the district is to create a district evaluation advisory committee and then adopt the Education Evaluation Rubric to base the teacher evaluations on.
Dr. Genco plans to have all teachers trained in the new process by July 31 and all evaluators by Aug. 31.
In addition to evaluation, the law regarding tenure for teachers has also changed. Teachers who began employment on or after Aug. 6 would now receive tenure after four years instead of three years and one day.
If the teacher is not given tenure, their employment with the district is terminated, under the new law.

