Blog Reflection

The most amazing experience I've had in a very long time, not only academically but also personally and spiritually. I had the chance to spend a semester in the resource room at St. Pius X High School with Ms. de Souza and it was really gratifying.
When I first thought about being part of the mentorship program, I wasn't too sure how it would work out and how I was going to fit in, but I can now say that I would do it all over again. I am very grateful to everyone that helped me through this amazing journey which has taught me so many things that will help me through my academic career. I learned a lot of things that can not be taught in a classroom and as a student going through classes it cannot be totally grasped by their perspective either. Sometimes as students, we don't understand what teachers do, and we think that they just want to screw us over, but this semester I learned that most of them look out for us and do what they think will be best for our future.
Being in a classroom from the perspective of a teacher is very different from what I have experience in my regular classes. I learned to be more patient to understand that standing in front of a classroom is not easy no matter how much you know the people that are listening to you or how well you know your subject. I learned to respect the person who is talking in front of a classroom because they really deserve all my respect. I am thankful to Ms. de Souza for teaching me how to be patient, flexible and to let go, she really helped me to be successful in this course, I enjoyed every single minute I spent by her side, because I never stopped learning.
I consider myself very lucky, throughout the semester I got to work one on one with some students that have difficulties in their classes. At the beginning, I wasn't keen about the idea, as I wasn't very patient or good at explaining, but as the weeks rolled by I started to really enjoy working with some of them. It was surprising to me how in just a few weeks I could be so concerned about their lives inside and outside school. The days before I had to leave, many of their classes were doing their CPT's and to be completely honest, the thing that concerned me the most was how they were going without my help and guidance.
The best advice I could give to any high school student is to take this class, you will not regret it! Many people think that it isn't very useful for a University bound student to take mentorship but I totally disagree. Every student should have the social aspect of humanity which you will experience in this class! This class will allow you to do more than just academics. As important as the academic part of school is, I firmly believe that a person can't get anywhere without this interpersonal skills. Being successful in this class takes a lot of effort, it is not a class in which you walk out after the period and can forget about it, you have to leave thinking about the conversations you just had, the problems your pupil just told you about, and how you can ease their way out of it the next day. Patience and perseverance are, in my opinion the most important qualities one has to have or be willing to work on to have an outstanding semester. To anyone taking this class in the future, don't forget to go out of your way to help anyone that needs it and have fun so everyone around you can have fun too.

How Are Teacher Evaluated

In order to ensure the Ontario teaching system prevails at an admirable standard, teachers must be evaluated on their performance in a classroom. The Ontario government came up with a system called the Teacher Performance Appraisal (TPA), this provides teachers with meaningful assessment that encourages professional learning and growth. The TPA system has two different components: one for "new teacher" and a one for "experienced" teachers, there is also different templates that the principal can choose from to evaluate the teachers. 

Every teacher in Ontario has to set some goals at the beginning of the year, this is written on their Annual Learning Plan (ALP). The purpose of this plan is to allow teachers to reflect on what they would like to improve on and create a plan for this to happen. This plan becomes the basis of their evaluation. The teachers that are getting evaluated have a pre-observation meeting with either the principal or vice-principal. The discussion is about expectations from both sides. After the observation there is another meeting to discuss if the expectations were met and if not ways the teacher can improve. Constructive criticism is important in any part of an evaluation. The appraisal is very similar like the one that Ms Villa did in our mentorship classes. Although, the evaluation for teachers is a fail or pass. If the teacher was to fail the consequence is not getting fired but rather go on a remediation plan to improve the areas on which the principal saw they had trouble with. 

Teachers like Ms de Souza, the teachers in the resource room, guidance counselors and staff in the white house get evaluated very differently from the " in-class teachers" because they don't necessarily have a class, but rather students that have different needs, they are also involved in various school activities to help students with their work and social skills. Therefore, teachers in the resource room get evaluated on how they meet the needs of the school, the students and other teachers.  

I think it's great that teachers get evaluated but in my experience I don't think the TPA method is completely effective, I have seen it year after year how the teacher changes the way they teach their lessons and how they involve students in the process.  Teachers tend to treat us differently in the hour and fifteen minutes that they have the observation. I think the TPA shouldn't completely change but I believe it should also take into consideration the student's opinion about the teacher, because at the end of the day, we are the ones most affected by their performance. The TPA evaluates teachers every 5 years, which in my opinion it is far too long.  Teachers have different courses every year and they also teach different levels, this might change the teacher's method and the overall performance. The TPA should happen every two years minimum in order to make teachers accountable for their ALP.