Some CPS teachers claim REACH evaluation system disproportionately targets Black educators

Yahoo

12-03-2025

After a career as a chef, Gloria Simpson knew she wanted to teach, and when she got the opportunity in 2002, she jumped at the chance to pursue her dream.
Simpson spent 15 years as a culinary teacher in Chicago Public Schools until 2017, when she was forced into retirement, she said, after receiving a poor teaching evaluation. Simpson's career came to an abrupt end due to what she called 'principal manipulation.'
'They used the REACH system to manipulate my rating, which lowered my rating (and) took away my seniority and allowed them to dismiss me over the other person,' Simpson said of the school, which she declined to name.
For more than a decade, Black teachers have left the district at higher rates than any other demographic, according to CPS data. Black teachers now represent 20.6% of the district's teaching staff, while Black students made up just over 34% of CPS enrollment.
The Chicago Teachers Union and several educators attribute the decline in part to CPS' teacher evaluation system known as Recognizing Educators Advancing Chicago's Students, or REACH.
Since REACH was implemented in 2012, the number of Black teachers has dropped by 10%, according to CPS data.
The decline has profound effects on not only CPS students but also the Black teachers who continue teaching in the district despite being subject to what they say is unfair scrutiny and discipline, according to several educators and union officials who spoke with the Tribune.
Simpson said that after a decade of teaching, she and the new principal at her school in Austin clashed and the principal manipulated her REACH rating to revoke her seniority and eventually fire her. When she filed an appeal in 2017, Simpson said she eventually won her case. But at that point, it was too late. She had already retired.
'The whole REACH system is too easily manipulated by administrators to do what they want to do,' Simpson said. 'Once the system is manipulated and you fight, it takes so long to get through the process. It took me three years … had I been able to expediently get through the process, I could have gotten my job back.'
REACH uses five rating categories reserved for different teachers in the district, ranging from teachers whose students are in pre-K through second grade to librarians, counselors and clinicians. REACH scores range from 100 to 400 and are organized by ratings of unsatisfactory, developing, proficient or excellent.
Some teachers in low-income neighborhoods, as well as those who are Black, have said they've been disproportionately affected by low ratings on their evaluations for reasons they say have nothing to do with anything other than race.
As Black teachers are more likely to work in low-income schools with academically disadvantaged students, a 2020 study determined race routinely affected Black teachers' observation scores, researchers Matthew Steinberg of Accelerate, a Chicago-based education research nonprofit, and Lauren Sartain, then from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research, found.
Their data from the 2013-14 and 2014-15 school years found that 89% of the gap between Black and white teachers in observation scores was due to differences in school characteristics, such as student poverty and achievement levels, while only 11% was related to classroom-level factors.
When factors like student poverty and academic achievement were controlled, the race gap in scores disappeared.
Several teachers told the Tribune the REACH system had been used against them. While the district says REACH evaluations are merely a tool to help teachers and they are not penalized for low scores, several who spoke with the Tribune refuted those claims. Among the evaluation system's detractors: the Chicago Teachers Union.
Abolishing REACH is one of the remaining sticking points holding the union and CPS back from settling on a new four-year contract.
'The single greatest predictor of a teacher's evaluation score is the ZIP code in which the school resides,' Thad Goodchild, CTU's deputy general counsel, said at a Chicago Board of Education meeting on March 5.
The union has continued to push for the end of the system. President Stacy Davis Gates told the Tribune that the members have told union leaders 'not to leave the (bargaining) table without' it.
Experts say one of the reasons Black teachers are leaving the profession relative to other teachers is that they are primarily concentrated in schools that have some of the most challenging working conditions.
While Black teachers are choosing to teach at these schools, they're also assigned to these schools as a result of discrimination in the hiring process, according to Travis Bristol, an education professor at the University of California at Berkeley.
'There are differences in how Black teachers are assessed compared to white teachers, and those differences have meant that Black teachers are assessed sort of more poorly when compared,' Bristol said.
Consequently, it produces a snowball effect: Black teachers receive lower scores than their white counterparts at more affluent schools, and they leave the under-resourced schools at a disproportionate rate compared with their colleagues, Bristol said.
The district, however, remains firm that the REACH evaluation system does not disproportionately affect Black teachers.
'We take any instance of potential racial bias, or any bias, very seriously,' Ben Felton, CPS' chief talent officer, said. 'We do not see evidence that our teacher evaluation system is driving Black teachers out of the classroom.'
Even though fewer than a quarter of CPS teachers are Black, according to the most recent data available, the drop coincides with the national trend that CPS is outperforming.
Over the last three decades, there's been a steady decline of Black teachers throughout the U.S., according to UC Berkeley's Bristol. In 1987, Black teachers made up 8.2% of teachers in the nation. By 2020, they accounted for only 6%, he said.
In 2017, CPS launched Teach Chicago, the district's comprehensive teacher talent strategy, which invests in the district's stakeholders.
Under this umbrella is Teach Chicago Tomorrow, which recruits the district's students to become the next generation of CPS teachers. District students are recruited into teacher preparation undergraduate programs, and Felton said this year a large number of the new teachers in that program are Black, although CPS could not provide specific figures by press time.
'We want our CPS students with deep experiences in CPS and Chicago neighborhoods to be the next generation of CPS teachers,' Felton said.
The district prioritizes recruiting teachers of color, according to Felton. To date, CPS has hired 600 more Black teachers in the last five years, he said, something the district is 'really proud of.' He's hopeful the number of Black teachers in the district will continue to rise.
'We went from a third of our new teachers being Black or Latino to half in five years,' Felton said. 'These strategies are working, and that's why we're committed to seeing them through.'
Research shows that Black students perform better and enter college at higher rates when they have Black teachers. But having Black teachers in classrooms is a benefit to all demographic groups, according to Bristol.
Tara Stamps, Cook County Board commissioner for the 1st District, said she'd had 'stellar evaluations' for the first 20 years of her teaching career, since she began in 1996. That all changed when REACH was implemented, she said.
'I never had a bad evaluation up until 2015-2016,' Stamps said. '(The union) had set up a way to appeal … what we knew was an unsatisfactory regard for me as an educator. I went through the entire process and I went to my then principal … and said, 'Before I leave this building, I will be recognized for the educator that I am, and it will be distinguished.'
After that, Stamps went through the evaluation process again and said she 'improved (her) practice in a way that was demonstrative to them.'
'It's the way that they set up the evaluation process that makes you feel like a gotcha,' Stamps said. 'It's not supposed to be that … but when it comes to Black teachers in the city, it is that. There's a difference between what the rule is and what the practice is.'
While the district maintains that REACH is intended to aid teachers, Stamps said it does the opposite. Stamps said it 'demoralizes them' and 'forces them out.' It's an issue the union has been working to change, she said.
In December 2020, Stamps was hired to run CTU's We Care program. In the program, Stamps was responsible for curating the professional development, coaching and mentoring of early career educators so, she said, 'they don't get got.'
The union sees the program as a huge success, with about 500 educators involved in the program. We Care has improved teachers' retention and allowed them to improve their practice, Stamps said.
One example that sticks with Stamps years later is of two teachers. One was Black, the other white. The two had turned in the same lesson plan, and only one had been scored poorly for it, she said — the Black teacher.
'It's that kind of blatant biases that are showing up, and it's not CTU just saying that,' Stamps said. 'Every entity that has studied the impact of these evaluations, particularly on Black educators, have come up with the same conclusion. Bias is contributing to the decline of Black teachers in classrooms.'
While the union highlighted these disparities during contract negotiations in CPS, Berkeley's Bristol said that this has also been identified as an issue in Michigan.
Looking at how students performed in Michigan on standardized testing, some students would perform at a higher rate in classrooms led by Black teachers. However, those Black teachers would still be rated lower compared with white teachers, despite their achievements.
In New York City, one of Bristol's colleagues found that when Asian American students have a Black teacher, they're less likely to be suspended when compared with having a white teacher.
'When Asian American, Latinx and white students have a Black teacher, they behold a more positive perception of Black teachers when compared to white teachers,' Bristol said.
Aisha Wade-Bey, a fourth grade teacher at Richard J. Oglesby Elementary School in Auburn Gresham, had several negative run-ins with REACH throughout her 25-year teaching career, so much so that she said she considered leaving the profession altogether. Consequently, she's lost her job as a CPS teacher — twice.
Wade-Bey's terminations were similar to that of Simpson — she said the principals weaponized REACH against her.
Wade-Bey said she was targeted at the first school due to her age.
After filing a grievance against her former employer, Wade-Bey won her case, and her 'entire slate' was wiped clean with REACH, including the removal of all previous evaluations. By this time, she had secured a new job at a school on the West Side, where things went well for the first few years. However, she soon noticed a familiar pattern emerging after the hiring of a new principal.
Twenty-three years into her career, Wade-Bey was being ranked as a 'basic' educator, and all this despite her class being used as a 'model classroom,' mentoring new teachers and being on the leadership team.
The REACH evaluations began to take a toll on Wade-Bey. Her confidence was 'broken down,' and at one point, she considered leaving the profession entirely.
'I had to either find a new school or I needed to take a mental health break,' Wade-Bey said. 'I was losing my passion for teaching, and it just seemed like I was just going into a downward spiral.'
But she continued for one reason — the children.
'I have endured racism (and) negativity, and have continued to persevere to ensure that the children within my community have a better life and are educated, to be able to be change agents within our society,' Wade-Bey said.
Calling around in hopes of transferring schools, she said she connected with an administrator she had previously worked with, who was now the principal at Oglesby Elementary School. Telling her she needed a 'lifeline,' Wade-Bey was transferred within a day.
Now in her second year at the school, Wade-Bey said she's in a better situation and feels she's able to continue with her passion of teaching and that 'might be able to make it to retirement.'
'They need to stop over-evaluating teachers,' Wade-Bey said. 'It hurts Black teachers the most. It's supposed to be a tool to help better your teaching; (instead) it's just a tool to weaponize [against) teachers.'