For the uninitiated (read: blissfully unaware souls not working in public education), Educator Effectiveness is Wisconsin’s bureaucratic brainchild designed to evaluate teachers. It’s a system allegedly aimed at professional growth but in practice often feels like a twisted game of educational Hunger Games. There are goals to write (so many acronyms it’ll make your head spin), evidence to upload, observations to endure, and digital paperwork galore—all squeezed into the 2.5 seconds of “free time” teachers are granted between classes, detentions, lunch duty, and literal glue scraping.
Basically: Imagine juggling flaming batons while tap dancing on a tightrope above a pit of outdated educational platforms—and then being asked to write a reflective essay on your form. Welcome to Educator Effectiveness!
What follows here is a parody version of Educator Effectiveness.
Standard 1: Planning and Preparation
I planned to prepare, but the copier was broken, three students needed emotional triage, and someone stole my chair. Nonetheless, I adapted using the sacred art of improvisation and managed to engage 28 middle schoolers with a marker, an old cereal box, and a prayer.
Standard 2: The Classroom Environment
My classroom environment fosters creativity, resilience, and occasional chaos. Students are encouraged to express themselves artistically, even if that means drawing anime eyes on every surface or sculpting questionable phallic shapes from clay. Growth mindset, baby.
Standard 3: Instruction
I delivered instruction using my voice, my hands, my eyebrows, and—when needed—interpretive dance. Students responded with blank stares, wild enthusiasm, or deeply philosophical questions like, “Can I eat the glue?”
Standard 4: Professional Responsibilities
I continue to uphold professionalism by attending meetings where I nod sagely while mentally grocery shopping. I reflect constantly—usually while brushing my teeth, grading at midnight, or crying in the staff bathroom. I also support colleagues by making sarcastic jokes that keep us all from imploding.
Artifacts Attached:
- One picture of glitter embedded in the carpet
- A student thank-you note that says “ur cool”
- My last nerve, laminated for preservation
Of course, this is a VERY simplified and comical version of what teachers actually complete for their Educator Effectiveness cycle. Every 3rd year we get a little letter in our mailbox that proclaims, “Congrats! You drew the short straw, sugar! This year is your ‘summary year’! Bid a fond farewell to the illusion of time to breathe!” Sarcasm obviously. This year I got the dreaded Summary Year letter, and I was observed by the principal, assistant principal, behavior & academic interventionists, and instructional coaches an obscene number of times. I choose to believe it’s because I am so damn entertaining—and so damn good at what I do.
Meanwhile, I am delicately crafting PPGs (Professional Practice Goals), setting SLOs (Student Learning Outcomes), and collecting data to prove that I’m doing my part to meet school-wide goals to help EL (English Learner) and SPED (Special Education) students achieve. Are you sick of acronyms yet? I’m over here swimming in alphabet soup! 🍲
My one measly hour without students each day—which I use to plan lessons, prepare materials, problem solve with counselors about the kid who created a sculpture of another student’s house being bombed (for real), scrub glue from tables (yes, most of the cleaning is done by me, not our skeleton crew of custodians), nominate students for various awards, plan for field trips, translate documents for students who don’t speak English and weren’t provided a translator because it’s “just art class,” and pack up my entire department for renovation (honestly I could go on for days here)—yes, that one measly hour is gobbled up by a variety of meetings with my supervisor about the aforementioned alphabet soup.
Once that’s all done, I barf data into endless forms and work some wizardry because the platform the DPI (Department of Public Instruction) uses to collect this info is about as user-friendly as a greased-up Rubik’s cube during an earthquake.
I write these pieces to preserve my sanity. I’m still doing this crazy job. I’m not sure if that means I’ve hit or missed the mark 🤷🏻♀️😂.
🎨💻✏️
(Coming soon: a TikTok performance of this entire breakdown with interpretive dance, dry erase markers, and a crown made of pencil shavings.)
Cosmic Tea 