Performance Appraisals Made Easy: Tools for Evaluating Teachers and Support Staff

Dr. Margulus has worked as a teacher and administrator at all grade levels of traditional and alternative K-12 schools. Her experience has included high-need, urban settings as well as suburban and rural schools. Her area of specialty has been leadership training. This has included district wide consulting and, during a three year sabbatical from education, directing a strategically-linked, outcomes based professional development program at a health care center employing 2800 people. She has also worked extensively in the business and manufacturing arenas in the area of workplace performance. Dr. Margulus frequently consults in the areas of Leadership Development, Workforce Performance and Accountability, and Parent Involvement and Accountability. Her approach always begins with an analysis of skills and a review of the client’s job description. She then reviews the skills analysis, and identifies the “gaps” between what is desired and what is current behavior/performance. Finally, she meets with the employee and his/her supervisor to provide a plan of development to enable the individual to become successful. A complete "buy-in" by both parties is strongly recommended for maximum growth. In 1999 she joined the Educational Leadership Department of the School of Education at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids, MI., where she is now Coordinator of the department. Dr. Margulus earned her Masters Degree in Staff Administration and her doctorate in Educational Leadership from Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, MI.

Jacquelyn Melin is Affiliate Professor at Grand Valley State University, where she teaches classes in curriculum development and differentiated instruction. She also has served as the Director of the School of Education Student Information and Services Center. She was a public school educator in Rockford, Michigan for 32 1/2 years, serving as an elementary and middle school teacher, as teacher/coordinator of gifted and talented students and as an elementary principal.