Hillsborough mentors and peers are face of Gates grant work

Posted Sep 14, 2010 by Sherri Ackerman

Updated Sep 21, 2010 at 08:39 AM

With the new school year comes the start of Hillsborough County Public School District’s new peer and mentor program for teachers.

The district in May hired 46 mentors and 72 peers to work with about 12,500 experienced and beginning teachers, respectively. It’s all part of the Empowering Effective Teachers initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The initiative started last year, when the district received a $100,000 grant from Gates to put toward an estimated $206,000, seven-year plan to change the way teachers are hired, trained, paid and promoted. The idea behind this reform is to not only attract the best teachers in the classroom, but keep them there with the end result being more successful high school graduates.

But it’s also about helping teachers, administrators say. Especially financially. Most teachers this year will start being evaluated differently with a pay scale that allows them to earn more in a shorter amount of time.

“If you are a great teacher, you don’t have to become an administrator to make money,” said school board member Candy Olson during a board workshop Tuesday morning.

Principals no longer carry the load on evaluations, but now share part of the duty with mentors or peers who observe teachers weekly, help develop lesson plans, analzye student work and even co-teach. Those observations count toward 60 percent of the evaluation.

In addition, 40 percent of a teacher’s review is based on student learning gains. That means their students need to show they are progressing, not necessarily that they are excelling.

Some teachers are understandably nervous, especially veteran ones. They may have a less-experienced mentor, but they shouldn’t let that stop them from getting all they can from the partnership, admnistrators say.

Mentors and peers are there to see what teachers do well, where they could use some help and how they can do things better.

“This is about all of us getting better,’’ board member Doretha Edgecomb said.