NEA Relaxes Evaluation Policy, Endorses Obama

Chicago

In what represents a small but significant step in a new direction for the National Education Association, its governing body has approved a policy statement on teacher evaluation, specifying for the first time that teachers should be required to demonstrate their impact on student learning.

Before its approval, however, union officials significantly modified the statement, adding language that puts additional caveats on the use of test scores as one measure of teacher performance.

And despite continued frustration with the Obama administration's education agenda, the NEA's Representative Assembly approved an early endorsement for the re-election of President Barack Obama, a move that puts its considerable...