The Restrictive Concepts of Teacher Evaluation and their Discourse Communities

Abstract

Teacher evaluation is a personnel practice in education and a field of study with multiple discourse communities, including a community in supervision. Many concepts from these discourse communities have influenced practice over time. In this article, I place teacher evaluation as a practice originating in the intersection of supervision and administration, describe its tumultuous relationship with supervision, and identify the many concepts that restrict its practice with examples of scholarship. This article is important “fieldwork” that scholars must periodically conduct on their niche to better understand its audiences, scope, and influences. Examples of fieldwork include: analyses of scholarship, collections on a theme, handbooks, histories, interviews of scholars, memoirs, and genealogies of scholars. This article is a type of analysis of scholarship for the field of teacher evaluation, as Bolin (1988), Blumberg (1990), Garman (2020), Glanz (2018), Gordon (2019), Mette (2019), and Glanz and Hazi (2019) have done for the field of supervision. I am often asked, “Is there anything left to study about teacher evaluation?” This article may help scholars broaden their thinking about the many discourses of teacher evaluation as well as their own niche. Understanding the nature of the discourses helps a scholar navigate its writings and research, situate his/her contribution, and interpret the results of emerging research.