In May 2024, the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) led a legislative effort to suspend student growth objectives (SGOs) for the 2024-25 school year for tenured teachers with existing SGOs. This initiative also established the New Jersey Educator Evaluation Review Task Force, which convened from July to September 2024. NJEA's representation on the task force included Vice President Steve Beatty, Certification, Evaluation and Tenure Committee Chair Dayna Orlak, and PDII Associate Director Elisabeth Yucis.
The task force was formed by NJEA along with other stakeholders to recommend improvements in the educator evaluation process. Their goal was to enhance student achievement while supporting educators' growth and reducing administrative burdens.
On September 30, 2024, the task force released a report detailing its recommendations. The full report is available at njea.org/eval-tf-report.
The recommendations focus on three main areas. First, they suggest revisiting how multiple measures of student learning are implemented in teacher evaluations through SGOs. The TEACHNJ statute allows districts to create methods for measuring student growth in non-tested subjects; however, only the SGO system is currently regulated. The task force recommends integrating this requirement into existing professional development regulations rather than treating them separately.
The second area involves expanding flexibilities within current regulations. For instance, highly effective educators can use commissioner-approved activities instead of traditional observations for evaluations. However, this option is not widely used due to its time-consuming nature compared to traditional observations. The task force proposes allowing districts to submit alternative practices for approval and suggests extending these options to teachers rated as effective.
Additionally, enhanced guidance and training are recommended regarding existing flexibilities in evaluation schemes—such as adjusting category weights or conducting evaluations outside traditional classroom settings without numerical scores.
The task force emphasizes that their report should be a starting point for improving educator evaluation processes. They advocate forming an implementation working group immediately—a call echoed by Gov. Phil Murphy—to work on enacting these recommendations.
Finally, they advise extending legislation pausing SGOs until regulatory changes are implemented successfully. At present, legislation A-5077 has been introduced and passed in the Assembly toward this end.
Kaitlyn Dunphy serves as an associate director of NJEA Legal Services and Member Rights within the NJEA Executive Office (kdunphy@njea.org). Elisabeth Yucis works as an associate director in NJEA's Professional Development and Instructional Issues Division (eyucis@njea.org).
