Saturday, October 9, 2010

Merit Pay

Merit pay. Isn't pay supposed to reward merit? Doesn't it do so in other professions? The automatic $138 per month raise each year in my district is little consolation for watching Joe Mediocrity lecture from literally yellowed notes, and pass out the same mimeographed vocabulary assignment he first made in 1981, all while making the same pay as I do. Actually, he makes more than me merely because he has been physically occupying space here longer. Truthfully, he makes much more than me because my union has been consistently building up the salary and benefits packages for these admirable elder statesmen in the district while young, dynamic teachers, still humming "Eye of the Tiger" on their way to work, can't pay their deductibles and vacation at the local park populated by tweakers and stray dogs.

The Washington state teachers union was widely credited with killing a bill in 2009 that would have simply swapped out a years of service pay structure in favor of rewarding "teacher competency."  In defending the actions of WEA, union president, Mary Lindquist, illuminates the very problem unions create.  She claims: 

"There’s some good reasons for our existing salary schedule. I think it’s one that has stood the test of time. It’s a clear, transparent, predictable way of paying school employees and I think by and large they’re pretty receptive to the current system. I don’t see a lot of need from inside the education community to change that.” (Jenkins, Austin, "Washington Teachers Union Kills Merit Pay Proposal." OPB News. March 23, 2009). 

This is precisely the problem!  Of course there isn't a need from inside the education community.  After decades of knowing you will get an automatic raise, no matter what kind of teacher you are, where's the incentive to suddenly be held accountable? 

While I do not usually agree with the teachers unions who claim to represent my interests, they do have a point when it comes to concerns about merit pay.  Its implementation is daunting.  If we tie the third grade teacher's pay to her students' test scores, what about the teachers before her who prepared those kids?  Furthermore, why should teachers in the poorest, urban districts have their pay tied to test scores that result from socio-economic factors largely beyond their control, while those who live in affluent districts reap the rewards earned by good parenting and high economic status?  Should base salaries be derived from merit based criteria or only bonus money?  Furthermore, is our only measure of successful students the results of their multiple choice tests at the end of the year, or do our claims to educate the "whole child" mean anything?  How do we quantify success?  As teachers, we all know it usually cannot be recorded on a scantron, no offense to you math teachers out there.  Despite legitimate concerns about how best to implement merit pay, the answer cannot be merely to reject it outright.

As is always the case, we teachers make the worst students, and what do we see in our students when the bar is low and "predictable"?  Most rise only to the low standard.  If you raise the bar in the classroom, the limbo party stops and students stretch themselves beyond what they perceived their capacities to be.  Competition is healthy!  It's true in the classroom and in our profession.  Excellent teachers are not afraid of merit pay.  In fact, many great teachers welcome the chance to be both held accountable by their profession and rewarded for their hard work.  My master teacher told me many years ago that the best teachers constantly doubt how well they are doing, reflect upon their teaching and search for ways to improve.  Those who don't probably aren't doing a very good job.  As a teacher, if I don't want to question my own practice or challenge myself to improve, why would I be calling for the people writing the paychecks to do so?

The rewards in public education are always intrinsic in the current system, and that just doesn't encourage greatness.  When a teacher takes on outside tutoring, advises one or more clubs, or designs curriculum that requires students to engage in higher level thinking and rigorous work, the rewards should not just be an occasional grateful parent phone call or a superficial, "Keep up the good work!" and insincere chuck on the shoulder from the principal.

People often speak of teaching in elevated, moral terms, like it's a religious calling. Certainly there is truth to that. In fact, students, parents, and administrators should rejoice in that reality -- most teachers are in it for all the right reasons. People often cynically assert that we're in it for the summers off, but that's like saying young men and women volunteer to serve in the armed forces for those great "Welcome Home" parades. The fact that becoming a teacher requires a bit of self sacrifice, perhaps a bit of a calling, doesn't mean the job does not deserve compensation.  If this were truly a religious calling, then our housing, food and expenses would all be paid for by the church, and I wouldn't have any children to feed because of my vow of chastity and poverty.  Just because we want to inspire out students, just because we didn't seek fame and glory in our career choice, doesn't then mean that we should be shut out of financial reward or compensation for a job WELL done, not just a job done.

Don't get me wrong--I love the Facebook message from a recent grad who thanked me for her senior English class. She said it was clear I put my heart into my teaching and that despite my reputation for being "mean" or "hard", she quickly realized I just wanted to prepare them for the proverbial "real world".  I treasure the flowers and card I received last June from a senior girl who wanted to thank me for helping her when she was being bullied as a freshman.  I'm tickled by the 19 year old boy working at the local smoothie shop who bemoans how much he misses "this place" when he comes by to visit. Those are the carrots that keep teachers moving forward, no matter how heavy the burdens we bear. But those don't pay for soccer or Disneyland for my kids. They don't repaint my house or fix my car when it suddenly decides it won't get me two miles to my job one morning. However, just increasing teacher pay won't make public schools suddenly and uniformly successful anymore than Oprah's generous checks to a few successful charter schools will save the system.  Furthermore, charter schools, while often wildly successful endeavors, still aren't the pillowy manna from heaven we might wish them to be.

The link below is to an interesting article that points out how limited a mere focus on merit pay is.  The problems in public education are geographical and local, socioeconomic, and complex.  Can merely paying teachers more create widespread success?  Probably not.  Michelle Rhee in Washington, D.C. has made bold attempts at reform and been met with Oprah celebrity and union scorn.  A pilot program in Denver that has been mandatory for new teachers and voluntary for veterans, has been fraught with controversy and ambiguous results. 

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=is_merit_pay_a_distraction_in_the_fight_for_meaningful_education_reform


Merit pay can't be the only solution to the systemic problems in public schools.  My argument is not the traditional teachers-need-higher-salaries mantra. Instead, an entire shift needs to occur in public education.  We need to reward models that work instead of politicians and yes, teachers unions, denigrating any movement toward compeititon.  We need to liberate districts, allowing more local control over how their funding is dispersed.  The recent film Waiting for Superman presents the terrible angst of parents living in low performing districts, just hoping to win a random lottery slot for their children in a successful charter school.  Instead of opposing charter schools, as many unions and traditional schools have, why not see them as a way to change what doesn't work in all public schools?  Why tie the hands of administrators with rigid rules about how money can be spent?  California is one of the worst offenders there.  Merit pay is only one element of reform, and the influx of homeschoolers and charter schools in the last two decades demands that traditional schools change or become obsolete. However, once Oprah moves on to discussing her favorite new scarf and Julia Roberts's latest comedy, once the public school question again can't be fixed by a two minute slot on CNN, we in education will again be left with these problems to solve. 

I'm not sure how to fairly achieve merit pay; implementation is fraught with peril. However, just because we aren't sure how best to reach our destination, doesn't mean we just give up on the journey.  Do you tell your struggling students in danger of failing to just forget about graduation and give up when they come to you deflated and ready to quit?  No, you don't.  Physician, heal thyself!

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