The Northport Public School Board of Education (BOE) unanimously voted December 11 to approve the rating of superintendent Neil Wetherbee as “effective” for his 2023 district leader evaluation. Unlike other school districts in Leelanau County, Northport does not produce an evaluation document with specific ratings of each domain. However, Wetherbee said the district continues to follow the Marzano Teacher Evaluation System, one of the evaluations recommended by the Michigan Council of Educator Effectiveness.
Wetherbee is rated on various “elements” in six different domains as a district leader. The domains are: Domain one is “A data-driven focus to support student achievement,” domain two is “continuous support for improvement of instruction, domain three is “continuous support for a guaranteed and viable curriculum,” domain four is “community of care and collaboration,” domain five is “district core values,” and domain six, “resource allocation management.” Also assessed during the evaluation is student growth.
“I provide evidence to the board of those domains (throughout the year) and then at the November board meeting, I recommend an evaluation. The board debates the recommendation, and in December they vote on it,” Wetherbee said. “Then there’s our growth data for the district, which is the same for our teachers, and that was also effective… So the combination of those six domains plus the growth data was a recommendation of ‘effective,’ which the board accepted.”
Wetherbee said with each of the domains having three to four elements, as you go down that progression, elements get more complex. Through the evaluation process, he said he will either select the same element next year if it’s not to the level of satisfaction they aim for, or will select the next more challenging element in a particular domain.
In domain one, which has an emphasis on data driven interventions, Wetherbee explained how it also focused on setting goals to help students meet their individual needs, while having systems in place to gather and share data with staff. Within that domain, Wetherbee also highlighted the ways they monitor how students are doing in the year and identifying what supports they need.
Domain two, support for improvement of instruction, Wetherbee said the element he focused on has to do with supporting and retaining leaders. He mentioned examples like hiring a new principal and what they have in place to make sure that meets their needs, as well as setting up opportunities for staff to attend conferences for their own specific needs.
Wetherbee added that ensuring students get what they need was an important part of domain three, and helps create guaranteed curriculum with equal access. Northport’s state data shows how the district is outperforming “the state average and averages of similar schools in basically every subject in both progress and performance,” Wetherbee explained.
Shared leadership and delegating was a big part of domain four, as well as looking at making sure everyone gets a voice in how things are going. Domain five, trust in the constituents, Wetherbee said, is to make certain that people involved with the school feel like they are being heard and are having an opportunity to contribute.
Domain six, the last area the district leader is rated on, concentrated on maximizing resources and focusing on instruction and achievement, so Wetherbee talked about how Northport is using funds to guarantee they’re maximizing what students need to learn.
“Everything we’re doing is really towards student achievement, so that domain one, although I feel like we’re doing well with that one, that’s really where I’d like to focus some energy on making sure our students are being successful, academically and emotionally,” he said. “Then when they graduate and move on, making sure that our students are successful adults.”
