Teacher Merit Pay Is A Bad Idea
Florida's governor is planning to boost the state bonus program for teachers, even as Denver teachers walked off the job over their district's version of an incentive program. So it's worth taking a moment to step back and remember why teacher merit pay and bonus systems are just a bad idea.
First, they can't work like a private sector bonus system. In the business world, bonuses and incentives are based on a clear idea of success. Whether the definition of success at Widgetcorps this year is "We made a bunch more money" or "We increased the value of Widgetcorps stock this year" or even "We managed to strip a pile of dollars out of Widgetcorps this year," the end result is a pile of "extra" money (the end result, depending on the definition of success, may be a less healthy company, but let's set that aside for now). The bonus deal between Widgetcorps and its bonus-eligible employees is simple--if there's a pile of extra money here at the end of the year, you get to have some of it.
Public schools, on the other hand, don't make money, and school district success is hugely hard to define. More high school graduates? The football team won a championship? The school musical was really good this year? More students really got into Shakespeare? Larger number of students earned welding certification? The school's culture and atmosphere was so healthy that students really love attending? All of these might count as success, but none of them result in a school district ending the year with "extra" money to be split up for bonuses.
Instead, the pile of bonus money has to be pre-budgeted, and then teachers get to compete with each other for a share of a fixed pie. This may not establish the kind of in-house atmosphere you want for your school ("No, colleague, you may not see my materials for how I teach fractions--my CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Teacher Merit Pay Is A Bad Idea
