Students in Washington, D.C., will return to classrooms this month to begin a new school year. But at least five percent of their teachers will not return with them. Last month, the District of Columbia public schools told two hundred six teachers that they are not good enough to stay.
The school system dismissed seventy-five teachers last year. It was the first year of a new teacher rating system. Experts say such large numbers of dismissals are rare in American schools. But in Washington the rating system is not governed by the labor contract (劳务合同) with teachers union. So school officials have more freedom. The system is called IMPACT. Teachers are observed in the classrooms five times a year for at least thirty minutes each time. They are also judged by student test scores.
Emily Cohen, a policy director, says the National Council supports the IMPACT system She says, “This is an evaluation method that is finally able to find who is highly effective and who is ineffective.” Michelle Rhee created the IMPACT system. She gained national attention for her aggressive reform efforts when she led the troubled school system in the nation’s capital.
Some Washington teachers say their rating depend too heavily on test scores. For some teachers, half of their rating is based on how well their students do. But Emily Cohen says test scores are important. “Testing is probably one of the-it’s the most objective data that we have on teacher performance. So it’s not just looking at student test performance, it is using other sources of data.”
Almost sixty percent of the teachers who were rated “minimally effective” last year stayed in the school system and improved. School officials say these teachers received help to become better.
【小题1】We can infer from paragraph l and 2 that________.| A．there are more than 3000 teachers in Washington, D.C |
| B．this is the first year that teachers are fired |
| C．such a large number of dismissals is very common in American schools |
| D．schools officials in Washington, D.C have more rights to dismiss teachers |
| A．the test scores the students get |
| B．their relationship with school officials |
| C．test scores and other sources of data |
| D．how well their students perform in the class |
| A．objective | B．positive | C．negative | D．questioning |
| A．New School Year | B．The IMPACT System |
| C．Teachers Are Dismissed | D．Students’ Test Scores |
