OECD teaching assessment policies: Approaching the experience in Mexican basic education

Abstract

In the year 2008 Mexico signed with the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) an agreement in order to improve the quality of basic education. The main purpose of this document was the implementation of eight strategic guidelines oriented to the assessment of teachers by means of accountability and teachers’ training. Responding to this agreement the Mexican government implemented a reform that integrated the assessment of teaching performance in basic education as a process by means of which could be regulated the entry into the profession, the abidance in it, the award of incentives and the promotion to leading staff. This article has as purpose, on one hand, to analyze to what extent the country and the educational reform that has been implemented, complies with the teaching assessment policies suggested by the OECD; on the other hand, it tries to identify the nuances that those policies experience in this reform. The need to trail the eight recommendations led to review documental sources and the analysis shows how the Mexican experience pays attention to actions oriented to assessment by means of accountability but does not take enough into account the problem of teachers’ training.