The Correlation between Evaluators’ Ratings towards Teachers’ Appraisal

The main purpose of this study was to investigate the correlation between different evaluators’ ratings towards teachers’ appraisal: a case study in Ethiopian Institute of Textile and Fashion Technology under Bahir Dar University and to propose the solutions to the problems. The samples were one hundred senior teachers were chosen by using a purposive sampling method. Teachers’ personal files were the main instruments for the data collection. Finally the data were analyzed through correlation coefficient, t-test and rank order method. The result showed that teachers’ performance evaluation scores between students and directors rating, peer teachers’ and directors rating & peer teachers’ and students were 0.278** , 0.488**,0.297** respectively which means all the three evaluators rating is negatively correlated and inconsistent to each other. Based on the findings, it is suggested that the training should be given to evaluators to improve the evaluation skill. The evaluation criteria used to evaluate teachers’ Appraisal need to be prepared based on teachers’ qualification and field areas.


Introduction
To bring educational improvement, teachers' Appraisal is now being considered as a very important thing.In most cases teachers involved in teaching are evaluated regardless of their knowledge, experience or working performance.Evaluation of teachers' performance is used to asses and improves his/her performance and effectiveness.Evaluation of teachers could be done for different purposes out of which the primary goal is to encourage and promote instructional improvement.This is adequately treated in the objectives of teacher evaluation stated by [1] as follows: • To provide better educational opportunity, salary increments, promotion and reward to effective teachers.
• To identify inefficient teachers and arrange in-service courses to help them minimize their weakness.
• To develop positive professional attitude.
• To identify teachers who can hold responsibility so that the right person could be assigned to the right place.
According to [2] valid, reliable and helpful evaluation requires evaluators who recognize good teaching and who know how to improve poor teaching when they find it.Teachers might be distressed, dissatisfied or even burn out due to their performance evaluation results, which do not match with real performance.Appropriate appraisal should be based on a cooperative goal setting and that the appraiser and the teacher identify specific instructional improvement goals on which to work together.Teacher appraisal should also be situational, specific and built on trust between the teacher and evaluators.

Statement of the Problem
The purpose of this study is to safeguard and improve the quality of instruction received by students.To evaluate teachers' performance, the primary task is obtaining information regarding classroom behavior, out of classroom behavior and students' performance.The performance evaluation of teachers in the institute is mainly the responsibility of assigned Research and innovation Center Directors, Colleagues and students.But as the researcher could realize there was subjectivity when they evaluate teachers.The author [3] stresses that an effective evaluation program needs a trained evaluator.From the above facts, the fundamental issue is lack of reliable set of criteria for judging teachers performance.In the absence of clearly defined teaching traits the evaluator is governed by fancies in evaluating teaching.Hence, it is necessary to investigate the correlation between different evaluators rating towards teachers' Appraisal.
Under the investigation of this study, the following leading questions were raised to be answered.
• Is there any significance difference between different evaluators rating?
• The three evaluators rating is correlated or not?

Purpose of the Study
The main objectives of this research were: • To identify whether or not there is consistency between each of evaluators rating across semesters.
• To give suggestion and recommendation to concerned bodies who may take part in reducing factors that affect teachers' performance evaluation system.

Sampling Techniques and Data Gathering Instrument
The target populations of the study were students, teachers and administrators of EiTEX, Bahir Dar+ University.Due to the fact that in the institute there were five directors, the entire student and all of the teachers were participating on teachers' appraisal.To make the study more reliable the researcher used a purposive sampling technique to choose one hundred senior teachers file from educational quality assurance office.In this study, teachers' personal files were the major data gathering instruments to collect information.

Method of Data Analysis
Finally, the collected data from teachers' personal files were analyzed by using rank order, correlation coefficient and ANOVA.At the end depending on the result of analysis, necessary conclusions and recommendations were forwarded.

Presentation and Analysis of the Data
This part of the study deals with analysis and interpretation of data obtained from office of educational quality assurance were analyzed by using correlation coefficient and t test and ANOVAs.
Evaluators Rating The two semesters of 2015 evaluation performances scores of teachers rated by the three evaluators were gathered from educational quality assurance office is discussed under the following table by using two sample t-test From table 1: Mean 88. 87, 90.83, 80.2 & standard deviation 7.70, 4.81, 11.68 for peer, directors and students rating respectively.The result showed that teachers' performance evaluation result by students has the most discrimination power to identify the most effective teachers, whereas the directors have the least.Which is Similar to [7] revealed, Students probably know more about the individual teacher than experts who judge for a short period of time and can add to information gained through the use of rating scales.From table 2: the result showed that teachers' performance evaluation result by peers and directors rating is correlated positively and highly whereas the directors and peers ratings are correlated positively weakly with that of students' evaluation.Which is similar to author As indicated Table 3.the result of t-test shown that there is a significant mean score difference between their academic rank of assistant professors in students rating (70.3,92.84,79.7 and 81.02) respectively, on the other hand from the other evaluators rating there is no significant difference on the mean score of teachers with different academic ranks.This result shows students confirm that assistant professors are good in their teaching performance than the others.
From the ANOVA test on table 4, t=0.463>0.05which means there is no significant difference between the rank of teachers According to table 5, the correlation analysis indicates that, students rating correlated negatively and significantly with RiC rating.When we observe, teachers' performance evaluation score across the three semesters becomes negatively correlated, then the evaluators rating did not go together.Supporting this idea [4] revealed that there is a good correspondence between students rating and teachers self evaluation, but neither of these indicators are positively correlated with administrators ratings.

Conclusion
Based on the result of analyzed and interpreted data we have seen teachers and they assumed that administrators evaluated teachers' performance based on their relationships and external duties.
The evaluation of teachers' performance by students, administrators and peers had disagreement in their rating scores of teachers' performance, which means, if teachers' performance evaluation scored by students was high, then there would be high possibility of scoring low rating by administrators and vice versa.This shows that there was inappropriate use of evaluation criteria between them.

Recommendation
Depending on the conclusion, the following recommendations are forwarded.Inadequate training, low skill, lack of knowledge and experience of evaluators can affect the process of evaluation.To alleviate these problems, the following measures should be taken: • Training on the issue of evaluating teachers' performance is useful to be given for administrators, teachers and students.• During evaluating teachers' performance, the inputs, processes and outputs should be treated simultaneously.• Teachers' performance evaluation criteria should be different in qualification and departments that require the system.It also should differentiate effective teachers from the non effective ones.Proper feedbacks also should be given on the spot in order to improve in the future career.