Overview

Since its formation, the Griffith University Centre for Leadership and Management in Education has been approached by a number of independent schools to help them design and develop teacher appraisal processes. As Director of the Centre, I have been involved in these projects and been interested to note that, although schools agree on many issues associated with appraisal for developmental purposes, there are ‘home grown’ features which reflect each school’s context, culture and structure. This has led me to the view that there is no generic formative appraisal process applicable across all schools. However, what has also impressed me from work in these schools is the fact that it is possible to generalise a design process to help administrators and teachers tailor appraisal to their own circumstances.

To develop such a process, this booklet reviews contemporary literature on teacher appraisal, analyses action in schools to design and implement appraisal processes and reflects on personal accounts of teachers involved in them. It focuses on teacher appraisal in independent schools because this is where the projects were run, but it unashamedly speaks to all schools where teacher appraisal processes are not part of regular review and improvement procedures.

The text is arranged in six parts. Part one examines the origins of teacher appraisal and explains its dominant and emancipatory forms. Part two reviews contemporary literature, research and scholarly writing on appraisal and identifies emerging principles for good practice. Part three puts forward a set of guiding questions for those wishing to design, develop and implement an appraisal scheme for their school. In part four, a summary of the way appraisal processes are being run in seven independent schools is presented, showing the extent to which principles that emerged from the literature review are enacted in them. Part five presents brief case studies of the appraisal processes in three independent schools. Each account contains a discussion of the perceived effects the appraisal has had for teachers since its inception. The final part of the booklet summarises the major messages from the case studies before distilling a set of advisory notes for those contemplating the introduction of appraisal in the future.

From the Introduction

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Table of Contents

Introduction: Motivation and Purposes
Part 1 - Origins and Contemporary Context
Part 2 - Review of Recent Literature
——1990s literature
——Themes
——Emerging Principles
Part 3 - Constructing an Appraisal Scheme
——Guiding questions
——Generating answers to guiding questions
Part 4 - Survey of Appraisal Schemes
——Features of schemes in operation in 7 Schools
Part 5 - Case Accounts
——Case Account No 1 - Hillbrook Anglican School
——Case Account No 2 - Brisbane Grammar School
——Case Account No 3 - Ipswich Girls’ Grammar School
Part 6 - Summary and Conclusion