Questions To Teachers Regarding Merit Pay

[meltdown]

1) Will you do a better job educating kids if you are paid more money?

2) Will you try harder if you are paid more?

3) Will you care about your students more if you are paid more?

If you answered YES to any of these three questions, then you should find a new line of work. It would certainly be nice to make more money but teachers knew the pay structure when they decided to go into teaching. It is a vital job that is underappreciated and often thankless. Teaching also affords a fantastic work schedule and benefits. Mon-Fri, weekends off, summers off, and nice long breaks for holidays.

Most teachers will tell you that education starts at home. ie we are all teachers. They will also tell you that they can often spot the kids who come from single parent homes within the first couple weeks. Also which kids have parents that put an emphasis on schooling and discipline.

 

[DesertDevil]

Merit Pay

1. No
2. No
3. No

I have been teaching for 10 years and I am certainly against it. The main reason is that most school districts will base the merit pay on test results and other measureable things. This is not fair in my opinion because many different variables can factor into kids test results.

If the systems that were put in place were a perfect way to determine who were the good teachers and who were not so good, then I might see a point to it. But I have yet to hear of a complete and fair way to distribute merit pay.

Thankfully I have never worked for a school that has had this type of system in place.

Most schools I have worked for have either have had salary schedules or have given certain percentage pay raises after each year depending on the classroom evaluations given by the administration.

 

[DesertDevil]

And I completely agree with the fact that education starts at home.

Unfortunately this is becoming more and more rare.

We should be a help and support to the parents.

We shouldnt have to raise their kids and help instil values in them. That is the parents job, not the teachers.

 

[nhoj]

All teachers care about is if they can make to their car alive after school lets out. These schools are horrid. I went to pick my kid up and I seen some stupid looking gang banger looking at me like im stupid and saying curse words. I thought you dumb ass If I run your ass over in my Tahoe you anot going to be a bad ass anymore. LOL

 

[DesertDevil]

All teachers care about is if they can make to their car alive after school lets out. These schools are horrid. I went to pick my kid up and I seen some stupid looking gang banger looking at me like im stupid and saying curse words. I thought you dumb ass If I run your ass over in my Tahoe you anot going to be a bad ass anymore. LOL

Im very fortunate that I have it so good. All I have to worry about after school in the parking lot is getting ran over by all the Escalades and Hummers in North Scottsdale.

So far so good. I always have my head on a swivel.

 

[punter]

I can promise you that commissioned sales people are a lot more productive than straight salaried ones.

whether that has anything to do with teacher motivation I will leave to the experts.

 

[punter]

If teachers were on commission a lot class clowns might meet with an early demise.

 

[DesertDevil]

False. Class clowns run the schools these days.

Teachers are powerless. They receive no backing from administration when they try to bring the hammer down on kids. The kids that are disruptive and take away from other kids ability to learn know that they basically have no limits to their behavior.

Kids hardly ever get expelled from school anymore. You almost have to kill somebody to receive a harsh punishment.

School districts' income is based on student enrollment. The more students they lose, the less money they have coming in.

 

[meltdown]

I can promise you that commissioned sales people are a lot more productive than straight salaried ones.

whether that has anything to do with teacher motivation I will leave to the experts.

That is exactly my point Punter. If you have to pay a teacher more to get performance out of them, then they are doing the entire education system a disservice right now. I'm also quite sure we could get cops to write more tickets if they made a commission on each ticket they wrote, but do we want that?

 

[D2bets]

That is exactly my point Punter. If you have to pay a teacher more to get performance out of them, then they are doing the entire education system a disservice right now. I'm also quite sure we could get cops to write more tickets if they made a commission on each ticket they wrote, but do we want that?

I agree in theory, but the obstacle of how to really measure "merit" seems just about impossible to fairly overcome. Maybe just give supervisors and administrator more discretion to make determinations based on what they see. When it comes to things like test scores, there are just too many other variables to judge teachers based on that. It just doesn't make sense.

 

[kingbill]

Do the US teachers get paid according to their qualifications?
I know in many districts in Canada if a teacher takes more courses and upgrades their skills they earn a certain percentage more.

 

[nimue77]

All teachers care about is if they can make to their car alive after school lets out. These schools are horrid.

All schools are different. Gross generalizations are usually incorrect.

 

[nimue77]

Yes. The longer you've worked the more you get and getting a masters will get you more too.

Do the US teachers get paid according to their qualifications?
I know in many districts in Canada if a teacher takes more courses and upgrades their skills they earn a certain percentage more.

 

[kingbill]

Also instead of having an across the board pay raise of equal value having a year raise between 0-5% available per year.

If the teacher is doing an OK job, they get 2.5% if they are doing exceptional they get 5% if they are under performing they get 0.

Don't ask me to judge what to base it on but could be an option because those teachers that are doing a fantastic job could be making 20% more in 4 or 5 years than those just going through the motions.

 

[meltdown]

BO also stated he would get rid of the bad ones. What is he going to base what bad is? If you base it on whether you pass your students on the the next grade, even more illiterate kids will be rushed into high school rather than actually trying to educate them. If you base it on grades, teachers can manipulate that by lowering standards and curves. If you base it on standardized tests, teachers will concentrate on these tests instead of a well-rounded education. If you base it on graduation rates, noone will ever go to inner city schools to teach for fear they will lose their jobs. Definitely need to see more specifics on the plan if/when they become available.

 

[kingbill]

Ideally it would be getting the most our of what you have to work with, obviously if you are dealing with remedial kids all day, you fail rate will be pretty abysmal but if you can get the best out of them it should be rewarded...

 

[Dave007inVegas]

Melt, it’s becoming a trend with BO. Every day it’s something new. He makes a speech, gives no details, takes a bow and moves on. I wonder how long that umbrella will hold up when the shit really hit’s the fan.