Across the country, school systems are working hard to change teaching and learning.
Districts are adopting new curricula. They’re investing in professional learning. They’re piloting personalized learning models, competency-based pathways and new approaches to student engagement.
And yet, too often, the outcomes don’t match the ambition.
Teachers attend professional development sessions and ask, “Why am I here?” Leaders push for innovation, but classroom practice quietly returns to familiar routines. Momentum builds, then stalls.
Why does this keep happening?
One answer may be hiding in plain sight: We’re trying to change what happens in classrooms without changing the systems, or underlying structures, that influence how systems behave.
Seeing the system beneath the surface
Systems thinking offers a helpful lens for understanding this challenge.
At its core, systems thinking asks us to look beyond isolated events. It invites us to see patterns, structures and relationships that shape behavior over time. As systems theorist Donella Meadows argued, systems produce exactly the outcomes they are designed to produce.
In education, that means the results we see in terms of things such as student outcomes, teacher practices and even resistance to change are not random. They are the natural outputs of how systems are structured.
Some of those systems are visible: schedules, policies and curricula. Others are less visible — but just as powerful: expectations, incentives and definitions of “good” teaching and learning.
When we ignore these deeper structures, the underlying systems that drive behavior we are seeking to change, we often default to surface-level solutions. We introduce new programs or initiatives, but the system absorbs them without fundamentally changing. What looks like transformation ends up being adjustment at the margins.
Teacher evaluation as a high-leverage point
Meadows identified “leverage points,” places within a system where a small shift can produce meaningful change. These range from relatively shallow interventions, like:
- Tinkering with the constants and parameters of a system, such as staffing numbers or a change in resources
- Deeper shifts in rules that govern a system
- Underlying beliefs, mental models and worldviews born from a system and its goals
Teacher evaluation sits in one of those deeper layers.
It is not just a compliance tool. It is a set of rules that defines what counts as effective teaching and learning. It shapes incentives, signals priorities and influences day-to-day decisions in classrooms.
Put simply: what gets measured matters.
When evaluation systems prioritize certain practices, educators understandably focus their time and energy there. When evaluation systems reward compliance over innovation, they create a gravitational pull back toward the status quo.
This helps explain persistent tensions in many districts. Leaders say they value personalized learning, student agency or competency-based approaches. But teachers are evaluated using frameworks that were built for a different instructional model.
It becomes an “apples-and-oranges” problem. We ask educators to implement one vision but measure them against another.
The result is a confusion at best and misalignment at worst.
A policy window: Pennsylvania’s Act 13
In Pennsylvania, offers a unique opportunity to address this misalignment.
The law provides districts with flexibility to develop locally designed teacher evaluation systems. While many states have standardized approaches, this policy opens the door for districts to rethink what they measure and how.
That flexibility matters and has the potential to be a transformative force.
It creates space for districts to align evaluation with their instructional vision. If a system prioritizes personalized learning, its evaluation framework can reflect that. If a district values learner agency or project-based experiences, those elements can be embedded into how teaching is assessed. In this sense, evaluation becomes more than an accountability mechanism. It becomes a system design tool.
By redefining what “good teaching” looks like, districts can shift incentives, clarify expectations and create coherence across initiatives. Evaluation frameworks begin to form and reinforce the system, shaping not only how teachers are assessed but how they are supported, developed and recognized. And yet, despite this opportunity, relatively few districts have taken full advantage of it.
That raises an important question: Why not?
First-order versus second-order change
Part of the answer lies in how we approach change. Much of the work in education focuses on first-order change: adjustments that improve existing practices without altering the underlying system. Adopting a new curriculum, for example, or refining instructional strategies. This work is necessary. It’s also more visible and often easier to implement. But it has limits.
Second-order change goes deeper. It challenges the assumptions, structures and rules that shape behavior. It asks not just, “How do we teach differently?” but “Why does the system produce the teaching we see today?”
Teacher evaluation sits firmly in this second-order space.
Changing it is complex. It takes time. It requires rethinking long-standing norms and navigating policy, stakeholder expectations and professional culture. It also asks leaders to move beyond surface-level improvements and engage in more difficult conversations about values, priorities and trade-offs.
Given the realities of leadership, short tenures, competing demands and the sheer complexity of schools, it’s understandable that many systems stay focused on first-order change. But without addressing deeper structures like evaluation, the system often reverts to its original state.
Why systems snap back
This “snap back” effect is common in complex systems.
Even when new practices are introduced, the system tends to seek to preserve itself. Familiar routines, established incentives and widely understood measures of success exert a powerful pull.
In education, traditional evaluation frameworks are part of that pull. They are well known, easy to interpret and often tied to broader accountability systems. They influence hiring, promotion and recognition. When new instructional approaches are layered on top of these frameworks, they struggle to take hold. Teachers are left to navigate competing signals: innovate in practice but perform within existing measures.
Over time, the system settles back into equilibrium. Not because educators resist change, but because the system is designed to produce stability.
Implications for leaders
For district and school leaders, this creates both a challenge and an opportunity.
First, it requires a shift in mindset.
Before launching a new initiative, leaders can ask a simple but powerful question: Is this a systems problem?
Before launching a new initiative, education leaders need to determine if their problems are systemic. As detailed in The Education Changemakers Guidebook to Systems Thinking, the fundamental characteristics of systems thinking problems are:
- Systems problems create uneven ripple effects that may impact the source of the ripple
- Systems problems change all the time
- Systems problems are perpetuated by the structure of the system
- Systems problems do not have just one solution
If it is a systems problem, then surface-level solutions may not be enough.
Second, it calls for greater alignment between vision and structure. If a district’s vision includes personalized learning, competency-based pathways, or deeper student engagement, then evaluation systems should reflect those priorities.
This alignment strengthens coherence. It helps educators understand not just what is expected, but why it matters.
Third, it invites leaders to think strategically about leverage points. Teacher evaluation is one, but not the only one. Wherever leaders have influence over rules, incentives and expectations, there is an opportunity to shape system behavior.
Finally, it reinforces the importance of disciplined, ongoing reflection.
Systems change is not a one-time effort. It requires continuous evaluation, adjustment and learning. Leaders can use tools like pre-mortems to anticipate likely outcomes before implementation and system modeling to better understand potential impacts.
Importantly, this work does not require mapping the entire system at once. Leaders can start small, focusing on specific areas where change is both possible and meaningful.
A call to rethink evaluation
If we are serious about transforming teaching and learning, we have to look beyond the classroom. We have to examine the systems that shape what happens there. Teacher evaluation is one of the most powerful and most underused levers available to education leaders. It defines what counts, what is valued and what is supported. In Pennsylvania, Act 13 creates a clear pathway to act on this insight. In other states, similar opportunities may exist or may need to be built.
Either way, the larger challenge remains: What do we value enough to measure?
If the answer reflects our aspirations for learners, agency, mastery, engagement and preparation for what’s next, then evaluation can become a catalyst for transformation.
If not, even our best intentions may fall short.
The work is complex. It requires courage, clarity and sustained effort. But if systems produce the outcomes, they are designed to produce, then redesigning those systems is not optional.
It’s essential.
