Recently, new regulations were adopted, which, according to the website of the Ministry of Education, are part of activities that strengthen the educational role of schools and the educational system for the prevention and response to violence. In what way is this done, among other things? In article five of the Rulebook on evaluation of students in primary education and upbringing, it is said that if more than half of the parents of students from the same class believe that a certain teacher is not doing something properly, that is, in professional language, he does not conduct teaching and other forms of educational work in in accordance with the law and this Rulebook, the school will implement certain procedures.
At the same time, this is the article about which the public made the most noise. Some criticize it, others think it is good and useful. Vesna Jerotijević from the Union of Education Workers' Union of Serbia explains to "Vreme" that the disputed Article 5 of the new Rulebook on Evaluation does not apply to secondary schools.
Also, she reminds that parents had the right to report until now and that she could have been anonymous. He further points out that if the principal of the school received an anonymous report, a disciplinary procedure would be conducted, and the time spent in uncertainty - until it was clear whether the teacher made a mistake or not - made the atmosphere in the collective painful, especially for the one who was the subject of the procedure. concerned. Now the situation should be clearer.
"Certain steps are defined in this way. If more than half of the parents in the class turn to the head of the class, then he informs the subject teacher and the school director about it, and a professional council is organized to consider the application", says Vesna Jerotijević. Then, if, for example, the application refers to a subject teacher in mathematics, the professional council consists of professors of mathematics, physics and natural sciences in general. If it is seen that the application is unfounded, then the council can reject it, and in that situation the teacher bears no responsibility.
UNRESOLVED ISSUES
Dobrinka Kuzmanović, assistant professor at the Faculty of Philology at the University of Belgrade, psychologist believes that many decisions are made ad hoc, and that she has not seen that research has been conducted, nor that there are statistical data on how many parents have complained about the work of teachers.
"I don't know what provoked the adoption of this measure. Why this position within the article? Has the number of teacher applications increased? Where does that extra tightening come from? Did we ask the teachers? And the students?", says Dobrinka Kuzmanović.
The Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development has not sent an answer to the questions of why and on what basis Article 5 of the Rulebook on evaluation in primary schools was adopted, as well as whether teachers, students, and parents were surveyed.
Dobrinka Kuzmanović points out that the Rulebook is almost identical to the previous one, except for the mentioned, new part that concerns the assessment of the work of teachers and professional associates by parents of students.
"I really haven't seen any fundamental changes. In other words, everything that I think was not good in the previous Rulebook, I think is still not resolved in the new one", points out Dobrinka Kuzmanović.
WHY AND HOW WE EVALUATE
In her opinion, the key problem is the focus on summative assessment of students (it is clearly prescribed how many grades the student must have, how and in what time to get them, and what if the student is not evaluated a certain number of times during the specified period).
"It is necessary to revise both the legal framework and the method, that is, the purpose of the evaluation function. We focus too little on formative assessment", explains Professor Kuzmanović. And formative assessment is regular monitoring and assessment of progress in achieving prescribed outcomes. It contains feedback on the achievement of those outcomes, as well as the activities the teacher undertook in order for the student to progress, and evaluations of those activities - how effective they were - as well as concrete recommendations for further progress.
Dobrinka Kuzmanović reminds that we should not ignore the fact that assessment is the most sensitive and complex aspect of the teaching process, and that it is not easy to organize that process at all because it is conditioned by a number of different factors. Also, evaluating the work of teachers is actually evaluating the work of teachers, students and the school as a whole.
Only the teacher is never evaluated because his work is determined by various factors. Teachers' hands are tied in many matters, she says. "If you have prescribed by the Rulebook how many grades you have to give during one semester, school year or three months, then you don't really have much space for formative assessment, which is, in fact, crucial," says D. Kuzmanović. She further draws attention to how important it is for teachers to be trained in the assessment process, and emphasizes that she now has the impression that during their initial education, not enough attention is paid to this and that they do not receive the appropriate psychological and pedagogical knowledge to form a certain assessment, how will tell the student that grade...
TOO MUCH WORK, A LITTLE TRUST, TOO FEW PEOPLE
The question remains whether parents have the appropriate competence to evaluate the work of teachers because, as stated by Dobrinka Kuzmanović, there are exact criteria for evaluating the quality of lessons and evaluating the quality of teachers: "There are educational advisors - those who visit the school as part of the external school evaluation process, who are trained and experts for it - and parents can very often be biased".
She warns, however, that in the current system, both the directors of the institutions and the professional assistants themselves also receive limited initial education and professional training on how to evaluate the work of teachers and give constructive feedback.
There is increased instructional and pedagogical work, but, as she states, it remains unclear what exactly this means and what it will look like if parents complain about a certain teacher, and what that insight will be reduced to if we have a situation where professional associates are already unable to do enough to devote themselves to monitoring and attending classes.
"It seems to me that this is just another obligation for them, and otherwise they have their hands full because the staff of professional associates in schools has been reduced. Depending on the number of students, the number of associates is also reduced, so that there are schools where only a pedagogue works and no psychologist or vice versa", says Dobrinka Kuzmanović.
Vesna Jerotijević reminds that parents must be aware that none of the teachers wants to intentionally and purposefully do something to harm their children.
"We have to build an atmosphere of general trust that will be in the best interest of the students. And that means that parents have full confidence in the teachers and professors who educate their children and that they understand that we care about their children's success as much as they do," concludes V. Jerotijević.
The Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development wrote on its website that the new rules were adopted in order to harmonize with the amendments to the Law on the Basics of the Education and Training System, adopted in November last year, which foresees the numerical evaluation of governance in primary and secondary schools, starting from second grade of elementary school.
Minister of Education Prof. Dr. Slavica Đukić Dejanović explained that the goal of this measure is to be preventive: "It is important for students to know that their behavior is also evaluated and that the evaluation of governance affects their results and overall success."
Vesna Jerotijević says that according to the Law on the Basics of the Education and Training System, it was valid that if a student has five to eight unjustified absences, the grade in governance will be reduced, and now that limit has been moved from eight to 15 unjustified absences.
In addition, if a student has been absent from classes for 15 days, special remedial classes must be organized for him, which, according to V. Jerotijević, "disrupts the work of the school in the sense that the schedule of classes is already so crowded that we have a problem organizing remedial classes, the which is already planned by the curriculum, not to mention the individual lessons that will be organized only for students who have been absent from school more often".
He reminds that the grade in governance was almost descriptive, and that it was included in the average grade from the fifth grade, but now it is included in the average grade of general success from the second grade of elementary school. If the student commits a violation, the grade in the subject is reduced, but the reduced grade is not transferred to the new grade.
DIGNITY OF TEACHERS
Finally, there is often talk about respect for authority and the reduced reputation of educators. Vesna Jerotijević points out that real values are neglected and that children who grow up in a society that is flooded with hate speech, whether it comes from the media or social networks, and that they follow it all.
"We try to instill in them that education is important, but the general social picture denies us," she says. "The role is now on the family, to recognize that the real values and real models are precisely in the schools".
Then he says that it is necessary "to restore dignity to a profession that has been devastated and threatened for decades. It is the first step that would change the general picture, because when you have a profession of reputation and respect, then it is a profession that deserves both attention and understanding".
When will we know that things have come to their own, that we are going to get better? Vesna Jerotijević believes that when a serious number of young people want to study teaching, they want to work in that profession, when that profession is paid as it should be and when we understand that education is one of the main carriers of the social system and process.
