Greeley-based KUNC public radio’s Ann Marie Awad continues her ongoing inquiry into Colorado’s teacher shortage – it’s especially acute in rural schools – and she turns up an another possible factor: The state’s watershed teacher-evaluation policy, implemented by the legislature and signed into law in 2010.

In a piece aired this week, Awad talks to educators who surmise the teacher-accountability measure – lauded by some as an overdue education reform and derided by others as convoluted and meaningless – could be another hurdle to hiring and retaining teachers. Those quoted in the story include state Rep. Barbara McLachlan, D-Durango, a former teacher herself who this year sponsored legislation to study the state’s teacher shortage:

… McLachlan knows this first hand; just four years ago, she was in her classroom at Durango High School, receiving the last evaluation of her teaching career.

“One girl had laryngitis and said, ‘I just didn’t want to miss your class but I can’t talk today.’ So I said, ‘Can you write what you want to say? ‘ and she goes, ‘Yup,'” McLachlan explains. “So she handed in a two-page paper for me at the end of class, and the assistant principal marked me down. He says, ‘Not everybody participated.'”

… To her, evaluations like the one she received are just another hoop to go through, one that teachers don’t take seriously. And in her opinion, one that may be driving teachers out of the classroom.

Whatever the link between the teacher-evaluation system – which had bipartisan support – and teachers shortages, Awad turns up another interesting development regarding the law itself: One of its more prominent advocates back in 2010 is now a critic.

“I haven’t heard anybody saying they want to leave the profession because of Senate Bill 191,” says Rob Stein, superintendent of Roaring Fork Schools. “I certainly haven’t heard anybody say, ‘I want to enter the profession, it’s gotten so much better since Senate Bill 191.'”

In 2010, when Stein was the principal of Manual High School in Denver, he was a strong supporter of SB 191 – even testifying in favor of it at the statehouse, and appearing in a campaign ad by the group Stand for Children. Now, seven years since, he’s had a change of heart after seeing how the law has been implemented.

Unintended consequences of a policy that itself is now prompting second thoughts? Here’s the link again to the full story – including a defense of the law from supporters like Democratic former state Sen. Michael Johnston, of Denver, now a candidate for governor.