How to improve high school teachers?
Ask students, perhaps.
Lawmakers this week sent Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a bill to create the state's first formal system for soliciting opinions of high school students about their classes and teacher effectiveness.
Senate Bill 1422 would authorize student governments at each high school to appoint a committee of students and faculty to develop surveys for "fostering improved communication between pupils and teachers, and improving individual classes."
Sen. Gloria Romero, a Los Angeles Democrat who proposed the bill, said nobody knows better than students which teaching methods serve them best.
"Empowering our students with a voice in their education underscores the need for every classroom to have a quality teacher," Romero said in a written statement today. "Students are the outcomes of the education they receive. They should most certainly be heard."
SB 1422, sponsored by the California Association of Student Councils, passed the Assembly and Senate by votes of 54-12 and 22-4, respectively. The California Teachers Association opposed the bill, said Teala Schaff, Romero's spokeswoman.
High school teachers would decide whether to distribute such annual surveys to their students, whose responses would be confidential, seen only by the affected teacher, and not become a part of any personnel record.
Put simply, lousy teachers could just say no.
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