Bravo Mr. Hammer to speak up for Holmdel parents!

Parents should be at the center of the evaluation process? Just look at how parents complain about coaches. One day they extol the virtues of a coach but the first time little Johnny sits the bench, they want the coach removed.

If this is an insight into the mindset of Mr Hammer, it looks like we made a mistake electing him to the BOE.

Who said "Parents should be at the center of the evaluation process"? It is these very exaggerations of what was REALLY said that causes rumor and chaos as demonstrated daily by the lack of communication with our Super and BOE in the recent past. I was at the meeting and Mr. Hammer said the parents input should also be considered....and I along with every parent I've spoken to since agree. Of course when the teachers know they are being observed, it is a stellar day. I have always thought at the end of the year there should be an optional anonymous evaluation form sent out to the parents and to the kids. Most parents will never speak up about many issues because they are afraid of backlash against their child; this is the feedback I've always heard. I completely understand and I was one of them until my child was poisoned at Satz this year and then everything changed. If I don't speak up and no one else does, it will be another bullet dodged. It can be decided how much weight these parent evaluations are given, but they deserve to be considered.

Mr Searles Parents should be involved in their childrens teacher evaluation .The observations now are a joke because the teachers do tell the kids to be on their best behavor like TRW stated especially when they know when evaluations are going to be . I'm glad I voted for Mr. Hammer a man that speaks up and that's what we need in this town and on the BOE board. We need people that CARE on this BOE that have children in the schools..Here we go again with coaches . I don't appreciate my son being verbally abused by a coach . Your son must be a coaches pet if he didn't get verbally abused nor does he sit the bench right Mr. Searless.. So if you want to start this topic Mr. Searles bring it. Im sure there are other parents out there that feel the same way. Your just a loud mouth .

there are articles on the patch March 15, 2012
Is An Ombudsman Needed in Holmdel School District?

An irate parent releases long pent-up frustration Wednesday with the athletic program. The Superintendent launches an investigation into the matter. Would an ombudsman have helped?

By Christina Johnson
Email the author
March 15, 2012

I was at the last BOE meeting and applaud Mr. Hammer for raising the topic of parental input into teacher evaluations. At no time did he suggest that it be the overwhelming aspect of the evaluation but instead wanted to see if there was an opportunity to have it included.

President Vander Woude did raise the point that it seemed the State allowed for up to 10% of the teacher evaluation to be at the discretion of the school district which I would support some portion of that being parental feedback. As mentioned earlier in this thread, feedback swings both ways and so far having had three kids enter the school system the vast majority of my feedback would be positive with perhaps a couple minor points of constructive criticism here and there over the years.

For anyone to suggest that Mr. Hammer's intention was to have teachers solely evaluated by parents is either ignorant of what was actually said at the BOE meeting or is willingly ignoring it in an attempt to paint Mr. Hammer in a bad light.

Seems to me with "The Hammer" on the board and "Big Mike" having his back... we are good to go!!!!

And one more thing...

What was really annoying was the fact that when Mr. Hammer first asked if there was any opportunity for parental input into the evaluations, the administration basically brushed the notion aside offering no level of effort to explore the possibility.

I guess since most of us parents have never OBSERVED, STUDIED, or TAUGHT (right anonymous?) we are not qualified to provide feedback.

I guess the only thing we are good for is PAYING THE FRIGGIN' BILL......

When will we be having the conversation around the Administrative Evaluation Methodology and the heavily weighted parental aspect of that?

Thank you everyone for your comments/feedback to this article. I appreciate the Patch for allowing us to have a healthy discussion on this topic.
Just to clarify a few points, the article above stated,
"Board member Joseph Hammer said while the Danielson method does evaluate the amount and effectiveness of teacher and parent communication, he believes parent input should have more weight."
I can understand how Mr. Searles or Anonymous could confuse this statement by thinking that I wanted parents evaluation to be the main or only weighting factor. As Ms Brew and others aptly pointed out, this is not exactly what I indicated. I said that parents' input should be included as currently it is at 0% and suggested 5% or 10% of the overall evaluation. My understanding is that test scores will be 50% and the Danielsen rubric will be 40 or 50% of the weighting. We have an option to adopt another measurement of up to 10%. The Danielsen rubric only had secondary parental measurement (tracking of correspondence, emails, etc.) included in its rubric, I suggested that parent evaluations be included as a separate measurement. Since children cannot evaluate teachers effectively and evaluators just by being in the classroom change the classroom environment, parents can fill a valuable role providing good feedback to teachers and administrators. Also, they pay the bills so I think they have a right to provide some input. Thank you for your input and I hope that clarified my views.

Thank-you Mr. Hammer for your thoughtful and clarifying post. Seems like you made quite a splash at your first meeting, so keep up the good work.

Many of the comments here were again deleted...including TRW, Anonymous and mine...why?

Like anything else in life, it's the results than count. Fewer and fewer of Holmdel's best and brightest are being admitted to Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and other top rated schools. Is this the result of the "feel good" era that has crept into our school system? The demise of Bell Laboratories and the infamous BUYOUT of 10 top teachers and administrators at once, followed by a revolving door in the Superintendent's and administrator's offices have had a negative effect on the once mighty Holmdel School System. With few exceptions, Holmdel has been blessed with excellent teachers over the years.

Parent input is absolutely crucial... especially for the "average " kids in holmdelschools. One thing they can add to the evaluation to gain some insight into.parents thoughts is a simple question of how many people hire tutors and why. So many people use tutors and I think the district should understand why..

@Kaitlyn...since "Anonymous" has explained that he deleted his comments, i suppose anyone who hit "reply" to his original comment were also deleted because of his actions but I appreciate you answering my question. Refreshing change!
....and to Anonymous - everyone is entitled to their opinion and just because people don't agree with yours is no reason to "quit". As Robert said, no one had "venom or hatred" in any of their replies. If those replies were considered by you venomous or hateful then the same could be said about yours. You obviously were not at the meeting as evidenced by your comments so those of us that were there were trying to explain what actually happened. We all can disagree and I think that different views are welcome here now.

Hahaha....Love Big Mike! Sometimes I feel like the Saturday Night Live skit re:Sandy where Bloomberg spoke and the Hearing Impaired translator "said" what he really meant. I think Big Mike sometimes is our translator....keep telling your side...everyone should be allowed to.

I think most parent evaluations of our teachers would be positive. We have some great teachers here in Holmdel. It's not the teachers fault that our Administration has handcuffed and burdened many of them with horrible choices in curriculum (i.e. Readers and Writers Workshop) and poor leadership at the top. What I'd really love to see is parental input into ADMINISTRATION evaluations. Unfortunately I'd have to give many of our top Administrators an "F" due to wasting time and money lodging frivolous lawsuits, extremely poor communication, excessive finger pointing, working at other jobs while on our dime, and more.
P.S. Mrs. Duncan, please make a reminder "note-to-self" about the upcoming Newsweek List of Top Public High Schools survey. In compiling the data to be used in determining its top schools, Newsweek sends surveys to administrators, principals, guidance counselors, and AP coordinators at over 10,000 public schools across the country. A few years ago you claimed that no one in our district ever received the survey, and that was why we were not included. Please make a note in your planner to FOLLOW UP with Newsweek if they happen to forget to send us the survey again this year. Newsweek's List of Top Public High Schools Does Not Include Holmdel
http://holmdel-hazlet.patch.com/articles/newsweeks-list-of-top-public-high-schools-does-not-include-holmdel

As a Holmdel parent who had a high school child applying for colleges during that time it is not comforting to know that HHS was part of an elite and exclusive group of 10-15 schools that failed to submit their data to be ranked in the Newsweek Top High Schools survey. In my humble opinion we should have been ranked #1 for having a Superintendent and Principal asleep at the wheel.

As per the NJ DOE:

http://blogs.app.com/learning/2013/03/06/nj-teacher-principal-evaluations-move-forward/

Happened yet again. Last time was Newsweek this time with US News & World Report. Superintendent Duncan and Principal asleep at the wheel again.
http://holmdel-hazlet.patch.com/articles/holmdel-high-slighted-in-top-high-schools-ranking