High stakes standardized and local testing along with observation-based teacher effectiveness measures are swiftly being mandated across the country. Policy makers are leaning heavily on this wave of teacher evaluation and accountability to improve teaching and learning. Little is known, however, about how teacher evaluation systems are impacting teaching and learning in physical education (PE).
Using Fullan’s model for school change as a framework, this study begins to delve into how this evaluation process is being implemented and how it is impacting administrators, teachers and students in PE. Fullan presents three phases of school change: initiation, implementation and institutionalization. This study investigates the initiation and early stages of implementation to assess the changes to high school PE resulting from a new teacher evaluation system.
Method:
This study took place over an 18 month period in three suburban districts in the New York metropolitan area. Interviews with PE administrators, PE teachers and students along with observations of PE classes were conducted at the beginning of the first and the end of the second years of a new teacher evaluation system. During these time periods researchers immersed themselves in the schools through observations, informal interviews and collecting artifacts.
Analysis/Results:
Data were analyzed to find common themes and patterns using the constant comparative method. The first theme to emerge was that the pressure of implementing this evaluation system seems to land the most heavily on the physical education department head. With a lack of central office support, scattered professional development opportunities and new time-consuming teacher observation systems, many PE teachers indicated a substantial increase in the time needed for teacher evaluation. Second, students and parents did not seem to be impacted by the changes associated with the new teacher evaluation system. Many students did not seem to take assessments seriously within physical education, thus negating the results. The final theme that emerged was that this newly implemented system seems to be minimally changing how physical education is taught.
Conclusions:
Fullan indicates that restructuring occurs often in schools, but what is needed to create change is a reculturing. This study suggests that only a low level of restructuring has occurred in the wake of the new teacher evaluation system within PE programs. With decisions being made about PE teachers based on new evaluation systems, it is critical that we understand how it is impacting teaching and learning in PE.