Effective Appraisal of Principals: Path to Improved School Leadership?

Why the need for an esteemed appraisal system?

Effective schools research has established a compelling link between effective, strong, and visionary principals and improved student achievement. Because school administrators are increasingly viewed as key individuals in determining the success of schools, the need for a well-regarded appraisal system that captures the essential elements of accomplished principalship becomes apparent. Administrators should be evaluated not only on their management skills but also on their ability to be instructional leaders.

Public school principals in the Philippines use the Performance Appraisal for School Administrators (PASSA Form B-1, n.d.) to appraise their own performance. It is a self-rating tool composed of only three major components (with weight assignments in parentheses) as follows: Occupational Competence (70%), Professional & Personal Characteristics (20%) and Punctuality & Attendance (10%). Other administrator appraisal systems include criteria domains such as: instructional management; school or organization morale; school or organization improvement; personnel management; management of administrative, fiscal, and facilities functions; student management; school or community relations; professional growth and development; and academic excellence indicators and campus performance objectives.

Unlike the appraisal processes in most countries wherein the principal's supervisor is responsible for completing the evaluation, PASSA is a self-reflective, self-rating tool that, when completed by the principal, is reviewed by his immediate supervisor, who will in turn recommend it for approval by the Schools Division Superintendent. Ideally the assessment process should combine the analyses of multiple assessors of the principal's performance as suggested by Santeusanio (1998), to yield a report that defines strategies for ongoing growth and development. The purpose of principal assessment should be to urge committed school leaders toward the kind of professional growth opportunities which can support leadership for the academic achievement of all learners. It should allow the participant to assess their developmental skills and to build a profile leading to professional growth in the measured skills (Texas Principals Leadership Initiative, n.d.). Despite the research-based suggestions, the performance appraisal principals, by and large, remains a subject of criticism by many as stereotyped in Russo’s (2004) insistence that most performance reviews fail to result in improved leadership.

In the United States and other countries, administrators are faced with an annual appraisal, upon which the continuation of their contract and compensation for work performance hinge. Thus, a genuine perspective on the appraisal process should include the perceptions of practicing principals because the perceived satisfaction of principals concerning the overall appraisal process influences the effectiveness and the stability of the evaluation. Their satisfaction with the process has correlation to the perceived effect of the appraisal on their future performance. If the practicing principal's role in the educational system continues to be perceived as critical in the success of students and in effecting change and reforms, knowledge about their perception on the appraisal process, that is professed as a tool to improve their performance, is consequential in improving the process should the evidence point to the fact that some of its components do not accomplish what it purports to measure and attain. Conversely, components absent from the instrument that the principals perceive meaningful and relevant may be suggested for inclusion in the review and revision of the instrument in the future.

Historical Background of Principal Assessment

Because of the preponderance of literature supporting the pivotal role of the principal in effecting educational outcomes, it is hardly surprising that some attention has shifted from teacher appraisal toward that of the principal's. Increasingly, local school boards and school district superintendents are seeking improved methods of both teacher and, more recently, principal evaluation. The understanding of perceived satisfaction of principals regarding the stages of evaluation and the overall process is important for it may influence the effectiveness of the process (Cooley & Shen, 2003; Harrison & Peterson, 1988).

In recent years, there have been various reports whose unifying themes revolve around the role of the principal as a decisive factor that determines the success or failure of public schools. Given the crucial role of the principal in determining the effectiveness of a school, it would seem vital that there be a valid proven plan for evaluating and sustaining the effectiveness of the principal. Unlike the attention given to teacher appraisal systems, principal evaluation has come about rather slowly and with great contentions in terms of the competencies and criteria to be used in the assessment of the principals' performance. It is well documented that high achievers and effective leaders depend on frequent review of their goals and progress toward those goals. They assess their own progress, and they also seek outside opinion. Secondary school principals who participated in the post-assessment surveys of administrator attitudes and self improvement efforts suggest that they perceive factors of performance to be significantly different from what they learned in school administration preparation programs.

In most cases principal evaluation comes in two broad types: formative and summative. The purpose, scope and manner of administration of these two types vary somewhat in such that formative evaluation is relatively informal and is geared toward helping principals improve, while summative evaluation is more structured. Its goal is to precisely evaluate performance and it is often used to facilitate decisions over compensation or tenure. Most statewide instruments used in the United States comprise elements of both types with varying degrees of emphasis on one type or the other.

Purposes of Principal Evaluation

The primary purpose of traditional performance appraisal plans was to link the school's assessment to the administrator’s salary. Recently, appraisal is being viewed as a means of personnel development. Appraisal is not something done to teachers and principals; it is something done for them. It is in this light that performance appraisal should be viewed as an essential and continuing activity.

Most of the purposes of appraisal systems can be grouped into three categories: (1) compensation decisions, (2) employment decisions, and (3) performance enhancement decisions (Castetter & Young, 2000).

Principal appraisal instruments, attain these general purposes: (a) identify the degree to which individual's or units deviate from accepted standards of performance or outputs; (b) sense deviation from a set of standards of performance or output which in turn may stimulate corrective actions or feedback to the principal; and (c) channel and shape behavior as well as to demonstrate to the community at large that such controls are in place.

Performance evaluation is designed to assist principals in better accomplishing their leadership role. A well-crafted principal evaluation system is important not only for the progress and welfare of the school’s students and staff but for the progress and welfare of the principal involved. An evaluation system is essential to professional growth and progress.

In an attempt to comprehensively define and capture the purpose of principal evaluation, the following list of its purposes is compiled from a review of literature about effective principal evaluation: (1) determine merit pay and advancement; (2) assist principals in better accomplishing their leadership role; (3) professional growth & development and self-improvement; (4) commendation of the principal; (5) school improvement; (6) accountability; (7) encourage communication within the organization by facilitating mutual goal setting between the principal and the superintendent; (8) foster a commitment to mutually developed objectives; (9) encourage the systematic annual evaluation of the school principal by the superintendent of schools; and (10) sensitize the superintendent to the needs of the principal and encourage him to provide assistance to the principal.

Because assessment programs can cost time and resources, school and districts have to characterize precisely what they hope to gain by principal evaluation and that they have to resist the impulse to violate that characterization.

Criteria of an Effective Principal Evaluation Process

Although there is no overwhelming agreement among experts on which criteria are best used in principal evaluation, and studies to date have been individually inconclusive in identifying the best criteria for evaluation of school administrators, there is ample evidence that certain school priorities should be identified to serve as the basis for the principal's evaluation.

The ideal principal evaluation systems are cooperative and flexible. Principals could work with their evaluators to establish individualized annual performance plans and goals. While some argue that the complexity of schools makes principals' evaluation on the basis of outcomes unrealistic, the need increases for models that tie evaluation more closely with valued outcomes.

While it is conceded that a broad range of criteria can serve as a basis for principal evaluation, it has been specifically suggested that these criteria could be combined or weighted differently, depending on the needs of the school system. It is important to carefully consider the role of internal and external forces on the school and school system when (a) identifying the criteria which will serve as the basis for a principal's evaluation; and (b) determining the purposes for evaluation. Repeated surveys of educators revealed that the many issues regarding principal evaluation eventually coalesced into three basic domains: organizational development, organizational environment and educational program.

In their meta-analytic review of 32 published and unpublished studies, Williams and Pantili (1992) found that leadership is the single greatest factor that affects administrative potential. They also noted that skill dimensions seeming to have more effect on job performance criteria are organizational ability, leadership and communication skills.

The following have been identified by Weiss (1989) as important categories of administrative competencies: leadership--the principal's ability to guide the school in accomplishing its goals; educational --the ability to provide direction and supervision to the instructional program; interpersonal --the ability to understand, interact, and communicate with all members of the school community; managerial--the ability to control the day to day operations of the school. Time management is crucial in the principal's ability to balance effectively one's role as instructional leader and building manager; and professional--includes the principal's ability to improve his/her own knowledge and status.

Experts advocate that school systems focus their evaluation process on the instructional leadership role of the principal. A primary reason for this emphasis is the result of the research that indicates that students in schools where principals exert a stronger instructional leadership role exhibit greater achievement gains on standardized tests than do students in schools where principals assume a weaker instructional leadership role (Connecticut Principals' Academy, 1990; Ediger, 2002).

Components which the experts agreed should be included in an effective principal evaluation process are: (a) a philosophical statement on the role of the principal in the school system; (b) a clear definition of the purposes on the role of the principal evaluation; (c) an accurate listing of the proficiencies of the principal; and (d) efficient procedures for evaluating the principal.

The North Clackamas School District in Oregon uses two assessment systems for principals: the Professional Accountability Program (for principals who have yet to complete three years in the district) and Professional Development Evaluation Program (for principals who have completed three years in the district). Principals in the Professional Accountability Program have eight job functions, each with several performance standards. The supervisor conducts at least three observations a year and provides narrative reports of each one. Principals who do not meet performance standards are placed in a remedial cycle (Peterson, 1991).While under the Professional Development Evaluation Program, principals establish personal goals for two to three years, and the district provides tuition, release time and travel allowances to assist them. Cash incentives of over $1000 are available for those who meet their professional goals. Formative, annual evaluations are used for its junior principal and employ surveys and frequent observations to measure performance in pre-selected areas. Senior principals are evaluated using a less structured formative evaluation and encourages autonomous projects that will benefit both the principal and the district.

Stages and Frequency of Evaluation

There are four stages in the process of developing and implementing the use of a performance-based principal evaluation. The first two stages of evaluation, development and preparatory involve the construction of an evaluation committee and the training of the evaluators in that committee, respectively. The formative phase outlines the two dimensional approach to evaluation: (1) procedures for assessing and improving specific skills (criteria) and (2) procedures for improving the ability to provide direction for the school (goals). In the summative phase judgments should represent a synthesis of information from the formative phase. Somewhere in the developmental stages, the necessity for principals to become involved in professional growth and self improvement activities is important and is stated repeatedly in the literature on administration.

In a survey of the perceptions of 460 teachers and principals regarding principal evaluation, principals were more approving of frequent evaluations than teachers; teachers were more approving than principals of involving more persons in the evaluation process; teachers are more likely than administrators to trust the efficacy of several instruments in determining administrator effectiveness; and that teachers felt far more strongly that they should be involved in principal evaluation (Mullins, 1988).

Criticisms of and Warnings about Principal Evaluation

The criticisms that plague principal evaluation is mostly about the gaps between the skills taught in principal preparation programs and the skills identified as important to principal performance and assessed school systems. Principals perceive the factors of performance to be significantly different from what they learned in university preparation programs or were assessed for in their districts’ principal evaluation instrument. These discrepancies between preparation, assessment and actual job performance may have enticed many employers of principals to rely more heavily on traditional selection and retention procedures such as interviews, in-house training and evaluation of self-reports. Few principals feel that their evaluation processes are appropriately linked with the process bearing on their professional development, though most feel that these processes ought to be linked. Also, little association exists between the assessment ratings and job performance criteria for principals. Several of the skill dimensions used in assessment appears to have near zero validity with job performance criteria.

Other criticisms about principal evaluation stem from the confusion and misperception about the purpose of evaluation and the formation and application of evaluation criteria. Only a handful of districts have clearly defined performance levels. Many schools also rely on standardized checklist ratings that are not tailored to a particular school's needs.

Research about principal evaluation often relies on perceptual data collected from teachers, district administrators, and parents who have little interactions with principals. Researchers warn that should this trend continue it will promote a fudge factor that allows power and influence to affect the outcomes of evaluation more strongly than do criteria related to schools' performance or outcomes.

Finally, principals believe that superintendents rely more heavily on external measures of principal performance. Experts were dismayed by a lack of explicitness in communicating the supervisor's priorities to school principals. They take this ambiguity, combined with the lack of in-depth observation of principals by supervisors, to signal failure to communicate, and thus diminution of the credibility of the evaluation process.

Synthesis

To be truly useful, principal evaluation must be based on clearly stated performance expectations, reflect established goals and entail regular observations. Although experts agree that there is no single, correct way to evaluate principals; one of the recurring themes authors of literature about principal evaluation strike is the need for close district-school communication and coordination.

Authorities recommend involving a broad base of school personnel in the process of designing an evaluation system and also consulting specialists in the field. They also emphasize the importance of direct observation, peer supervision and ongoing communication through carefully planned conferences.

Associated with effective implementation are these considerations: (1) the onsite observations of the principal by the evaluator, (2) the post-observation conference between principal and the evaluator, (3) the professional development plan developed by the principal and the evaluator, (4) the goal statement representing a direction for the school, and (5) the improvement of evaluative skills. Experts agree that the evaluation process must be tailored to the individual needs of the principal. Principals at different grade levels might even need to be evaluated differently.

The appraisal process should emphasize the importance of the establishment of goals and objectives since individuals and organizations must have goals and purposes if they are to be productive. If organizational expectations are clear to a principal, it is more likely that the principal will be able to achieve these expectations (Cooley & Shen, 2003; Weiss, 1989).

Formative evaluation, aimed at improving principal performance, can help build strong linkages and commitment to achieving the district’s long range goals. Teachers should be considered as sources of feedback that principals might use in making their own self-assessments. A summative evaluation becomes a natural progression if evaluators have already identified areas of improvement and developed growth plans during the year.

Because the effectiveness and stability of the appraisal system is the function of the principal's satisfaction with the system, only specific identifiable factors should be part of the instrument to be associated with principal satisfaction in the evaluation process. The acceptance of a principal appraisal system is necessary to influence principals' actions positively. Findings indicate that when a superintendent frequently communicates satisfaction in their performance, principals are more satisfied with the process.

It is deemed harmless for principals to be intimately involved in the goal-setting process and they should be carefully informed of how the various goals will be weighted and assessed. This knowledge encourages principals to focus on the aspects of their job deemed most important. A culture accustomed to instant gratification and constant change with the expectation of immediate outcomes without regard for the process may not be the best framework to promote high academic standards. Principals are expected, more than ever, to spend time in classrooms or communicate with students about their academic work (Cooley & Shen, 2003).

Principals are increasingly perceived as key individuals in charting success in schools. For this reason, the need for a suitable and compelling appraisal system that captures the essential elements of accomplished principalship is self-evident. Because principals perform a multifaceted job, their performance should be evaluated based on the many dimensions their responsibilities demand of them and for reasons that include accountability and professional growth, among many others.

References

Administrator Appraisal, 22 TexReg 4200 § 150.1021 (Aug. 1, 1997) reprinted as amended in 23 TexReg 5966 (to be effective June 11, 1998).

Andrews, C. (1990). Evaluating principals. National Association of Elementary School Principals Research Roundup, 6(2), 3-8.

Brown, G. & Irby, B.J. (1998). Seven policy considerations for the principal appraisal. School Administrator, 55(9),10.

Brown, G., Irby, B.J. & Neumeyer, C. (1998). Taking the lead: One district’s approach to principal evaluation. National Association of Secondary School Principals, 82(602), 18-25.

Castetter, W.B., & Young, I.P. (2000). The human resource function in educational administration. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.

Connecticut Principals’ Academy. (1990, Spring). A guide to the process of evaluating school principals (Monograph no. 2).

Cooley, V.E. & Shen, J. (2003). School accountability and professional job responsibilities: A perspective from secondary principals. National Association of Secondary School Principals Bulletin 87(634), 10-25.

Davis, S.H. & Hensley, P.A. (1999). The politics of principal evaluation. Educational Leadership, 29(1), 22-26.

Ediger, M. (2002). Assessing the school principal. Education, 123(1), 90-95.

Frampton, P.M., & Hirth, M.A. (2003). Teaching leaders how to lead better. Principal Leadership, 3(9), 61-65.

Gay, L.R. & Airasian, P. (2003). Educational research: Competencies for analysis and applications. (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill/Prentice Hall.

Governance of Basic Education Act of 2001, Republic Act No. 9155, Congress of the Philippines, 3^rd Session. (2001).

Harrison, W.C. (1988). The status of evaluation of principals: Administrators perceptions and opportunities and obstacles to improving the process. New Orleans, LA: American Educational Research Association.

Harrison, W.C., & Peterson, K.D. (1988). Evaluation of principals: The process can be improved. National Association of Secondary School Principals Bulletin, 72(508), 1-4.

Hart, A.W. (1993). The social and organizational influence of principals: Evaluating principals in context. Peabody Journal of Education, 68(2), 37-57.

Herman, J.J. (1999). School planning & personnel: A resource guide to effective administration. Lancaster, PA: Technomic Publishing Company, Inc.

Johnson, L.R. (1998). Performance evaluation of special education administrators: Considerations and recommendations. National Association of Secondary School Principals. NASSP Bulletin, 82(594), 24-32.

Lewis, A.C. (1997). Standards for new administrators. Phi Delta Kappan, 79(2), 99-100.

Mullins, T.H. (1988). Perceptions of Texas elementary principals and teachers regarding evaluation of principals. Louisville, KY: Mid-South Educational Research Association.

Performance Appraisal System for School Administrators, PASSA FORMB-1 (n.d.)

Peterson, D. (1991). Evaluating principals (Tech. Rep. No. EDO-EA-91-2). Eugene, OR: Office of Educational Research and Improvement.

Russo, Alexander (2004), Evaluating Administrators with Portfolios: Principals Report Mostly Positive Experiences when Used as Part of a Performance Review. School Administrator 61(9) 34.

Santeusanio, R. (1998). Improving performance with 360-degree feedback. Educational Leadership, 55(5), 30-32.

Valentine, J.W. & Harting, R.D. (1988). Performance-based teacher evaluation in Missouri: A three year report (Tech. Rep. No. BBB27074). Jefferson City, MO: University of Missouri, Department of Educational Administration.

Valentine, J.W. (1986). Performance/outcome based principal evaluation: A summary of procedural considerations. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED281381)

Weiss, K. (1989). Evaluation of elementary and secondary school principals. Orlando, FL: American Association of School Administrators.

Williams, J. & Pantili, L. (1992). A meta-analytic model of principal assessment. Journal of School Leadership 2(3), 256-279.