Piedmont School Board: Teacher Evaluations, Beach School Construction

What makes a good teacher? How do you help a not-so-great teacher improve?

A report from the Piedmont Unified School District's teacher evaluation committee dominated the discussion at the Board of Education meeting Wednesday night. Consultant Carol Boyd updated board members on progress in developing the new evaluation system; a pilot program is in place this year, with most PUSD principals and teachers involved in trying out at least one aspect of the new system.

Just the existence of the new program is beneficial, Boyd said.

"As teachers and administrators are involved in piloting, automatically practices begin to improve," she said.

The new program will replace evaluations based mainly on classroom observation with a multi-step system that includes teacher self-assessments (based on the state's California Teacher Standards), conferences, learning goals for students and feedback from students and parents along with classroom visitations.

One aspect of the process focuses on teachers who are not "meeting standards." The new program would provide those teachers with a support coach – a fellow teacher in the same school who would serve as a mentor, but not be part of that teacher's evaulation team.

Another step in setting up the new system is soliciting feedback from students and parents, something Harlan Mohagen, president of the Association of Piedmont Teachers, described as "the most difficult part of the process." Committee members are still looking at issues such as whether parent feedback about teachers should be signed or anonymous.

Beach School Construction

The board authorized a $36,311 increase in the "guaranteed maximum price," or GMP, to Cahill Construction, Inc. for the seismic safety renovation project currently under way at Beach Elementary School.

A second, much larger increase in the GMP – between $900,000 and $1 million – will come before the board soon, most likely at its next meeting.

Both increases trace to several changes in the scope of work being done at Beach, said Asst. Supt. Michael Brady. Those include concrete work to deal with an underground spring discovered on the Beach site during construction; a new retaining wall along Linda Avenue (the most expensive single item); repairing damage from dry rot found during construction; and changes requested by Beach School parents.

Brady said the overall costs remain within the project budget ($8,174,000 as of December 2011), with extra work paid for from contingency funds and anticipated finance charges that were recouped when the state released additional bond monies for the project.

He said construction is on track to be completed before the start of the 2012-13 school year, although a few items requested by parents (and funded through a ) may need to be added later.

A detailed look at the costs of additional work is included in the agenda packet for the March 28 board meeting, available at the PUSD website.

Parcel Tax Increase

Only one person spoke at a public hearing on a projected 5 percent increase in the district's Measure B parcel tax for 2012-13. George Childs, a member of the citizens' advisory committee on the parcel tax, urged the board to limit the increase to 2 percent and asked board members to consider tax relief for households with annual incomes of under $50,000 a year.

All five board members said they favor the 5 percent increase, and several said the board should consider tax relief for lower-cinome property owners in future years – although not for the coming year.

The board will vote on the increase at its April 17 meeting.

You may read more about the parcel tax increase in these earlier articles: PUSD Committee Recommends 5% Parcel Tax Hike, School Board Likely to Opt for 5 Percent Parcel Tax Increase and School Board to Hold Public Hearing on Increase in Parcel Tax Levy.

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