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Teacher Pay Could Be Tied To Student Performance
March 20, 2010
Teacher pay would be based on how well students do on standardized tests under a bill set for a final fight in the Senate – where ruling Republicans look poised to strike a blow against Florida’s Democratic-allied teachers’ union.
The Senate Ways and Means committee approved the measure (SB 6) by a 15-8, party-line vote, with Democrats saying it was wrongheaded to base all teachers’ pay on student performance, while warning it could drive instructors from the classroom.
The legislation is sponsored by Sen. John Thrasher, R-St. Augustine, who doubles as chairman of the Florida Republican Party. It would place teachers on annual contracts and force the Department of Education to implement some method to gauge whether students made learning gains over the school year.
While county school boards would still set teacher salaries, annual raises would have to be based on these new state performance standards.
The committee met for more than three hours, with teachers and education groups mostly critical of the measure, while business organizations and former Gov. Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Florida’s Future endorsing the approach. Bush has wrangled with the Florida Education Association, the state’s largest teachers’ union, for years over class-size and earlier versions of merit-pay plans.
Bush’s 2002 Democratic opponent for governor, Bill McBride, was heavily financed by the FEA and its allies. McBride’s wife, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, is the Democratic Party’s presumptive candidate for governor this year.
“This legislation, I believe, over the years will allow our students to receive the best education,” Thrasher said.
The measure is set for a floor vote next week. But the House has not yet advanced a version of the merit-pay plan.
Jennifer Barnhill, a teacher at Pace Secondary School in Tallahassee, told the Senate committee Friday that she feared the measure would jeopardize the salaries of teachers like her — whose classrooms include children with special needs. She said she has students who have Asperger syndrome, two who are rival gang members and three who are fathers. One student, she said, is now parenting his younger brother, because their father is in jail.
“He has no parent. He is the parent and I am his parent. No test can ever measure that,” she said.
Supporters said the legislation will put the state in line with proposals it has made in an application for the Race to the Top, the $4.35 billion competitive federal grant that could bring about $1 billion in education dollars to Florida. The state is among 16 finalists for the award, scheduled to be made next month.
Florida Education Commissioner Eric Smith, a proponent of the so-called merit pay plan, said that “America is going in this direction” on merit pay for teachers.
“For the first time we’re actually talking about connecting issues of student achievement to evaluation,” he said.
Smith acknowledged that the department still really didn’t know how all teachers would be evaluated. He said staff has been consulting with leading researchers on the issue, but there is no template because Florida would be the first state to initiate this type of system.
One method could have students take an exam at the beginning of the year and one at the end of the year. But the lack of a clear path was a major sticking point for Democrats who voted against the bill.
“What I’m not going to support is a system that has no idea where we’re going to land,” said Sen. Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach. “You have no valid pre-test and no valid end of course exam.”
Comments
30 Responses to “Teacher Pay Could Be Tied To Student Performance”
This idea should not be allowed unless the high- and-mighty legislators tie their own pay to the unemployment in their state. If the state is not doing well, they get half of their pay! If the state is not doing better at the end of their term, they are KICKED out of office!
I don’t think anyone should have the power to institute this kind of tactic where pay is tied to the performance of their subordinates test scores like teacher pay based on their student’s test performances, unless the one issuing this power also has their job tied to some subordinate’s test performances! That is the only way to understand how these teachers will feel and what is at stake for them.
Sw
When principals, reading and math supervisors with the county and state come in the classroom to observe teachers wouldn’t that be called evaluations. Also special needs students do make a difference.The students that are severe handicapped do not but the learning disabled that take the same standardized tests as the others without the accommdations do.Why do you think Huxford does so much better than Rachel Patterson and A C Moore? Because they do not have a high percentage of special needs like Atmore.
SW-
That would imply an entry and exit exam-works for me.
I’m sure you’re well educated, but I’m not sure if you understand entry/exit exams…….
Could you imagine comparing “typing” exam results which evaluate whether or not a child has memorized the keys on a keyboard to “reading” exam results which evaluate whether or not a child can analyze and synthesize and apply the skills of comparing/contrasting, reference/research, determining main idea, and using context clues in reading passages that are at or above grade level?
Should the reading teacher get more pay if students are successful?
Should the typing teacher get the same pay if her students have memorized the keys?
These are questions that no one would want to answer. Actually, there is no answer that is best for all involved………….
>Parenwithabrain
I am college educated; I work a job that is on call 24/7 even though I have weekends and holidays ‘off’. My job performance is evaluated annually by my supervisor, and approved by his supervisor; whether or not I get a raise or a bonus is determined by my job performance in relation to the company’s goals. My performance is based on the actions of 150 employees in several sectors of the company’s business over whom i have absolutely no direct control; these employees are included in every range of intelligence and skill level. If I can’t show or explain changes in the company’s performance then my job is in jeopardy.
I don’t have a union pulling for me; I don’t have tenure to give me security. I have to perform daily, monthly, and yearly. If I don’t perform, my company can replace me without any cause whatsoever.
The difference in my job and that of a teacher is that my employer can’t forcibly take money from you to pay my salary whether my job performance is good or not. By the way, I would compare my salary to most teachers.
I am not against teachers, I am just against bad teachers. An equitable procedure of evaluation should only be fair enough. Why is it every time some type of evaluation method discussed results in the moaning, groaning, and gnashing of teeth?
As far as I can tell, it is impossible to create a plan for performance pay that ensures that all teachers are evaluated fairly. Although it is definitely possible for a large percentage of low-performing students to show learning gains, several variables contribute to the fact that performance pay plans are biased. Class size, subject area taught, amount of uninterrupted class time, access to supplies and resources, administrative handling of discipline, frequent change in the scheduling of students, and student attendance rates vary immensely from classroom to classroom. Teacher effectiveness can probably be measured best by a combination of student surveys, observation of instruction and student/teacher interaction, and student learning gains on standardized testing. Even with this combination of evaluation measures, bias regarding which teacher receives what monetary reward will always exist. For performance pay plans to be effective, someone will have to create a plan that answers the question, “Is this teacher doing his or her best? “, and finding an answer to this question would be extremely difficult. …………..
How many college educated people outside of education face pink slips every year for the first five years of their employment? I always hear how teachers have this cushy job, working bankers (or better) hours, weekends off, holidays, vacation, summer. Yet I wonder how many of you actually know how many hours teachers work outside of the school? Preparing lesson plans, grading papers, etc. How many of you spend hundreds of dollars out of your own pocket each year for your “customers”? Meanwhile you are one of the lower paid of the college educated. You get to deal with children who have so many issues. Children whose issues often stem from their home lives. Parents divorcing, parents trashing each other, parents on drugs or drunk, abuse, neglect, homelessness. And then we want to freak out when the student doesn’t score well on a test? Seriously?
Then we have children who are learning challenged. Great. I have a son who is learning challenged. I can only imagine how welcomed he will be in the mainstream classroom. Will they try to force him in to a controlled ESE classroom even though he doesn’t need it? Just so they don’t have to worry about his test scores dragging them down?
This is ridiculous. I work in education and there are students who flat out don’t wanna. So now what? How many of you have jobs that rely upon what twenty students do in your classroom?
>Note
Apples and oranges. However, most doctors and lawyers are private sector; exceptions always.
In a way, though, they are paid by cases; successful ones do the best work and do well, the others go broke. In both cases there is professional oversight. In all cases bad ones lose their license after due process. The market determines rate of pay or success, would you agree?
I agree with Ms Parker, maybe tenure is the issue.
With the exception of special needs students, I bet reinstating discipline would help for those apathetic students.
The number of students a teacher has in their classrooms determines the number of problems that teacher has everyday. I highly respect most teachers. They really have to love it to keep it up, and most of the time it is a thankless job. We do have a few bad apples so to speak, but as a whole, I think we do have some good teachers. I don’t think they ought to be judged this way. My problem is with this tenure business. That’s what needs to be changed. We can’t get rid of these “bad apples” because of this. Janice Parker
Wow. Are doctors evaluated on how many patients live versus those who die? Are attorneys evaluated on how many cases they win versus how many they lose? Who decides if these professionals can keep their license or charge a client/patient a fee for services rendered if they lose one, two, three cases/lives a year?
Teachers are accountable for what they teach, mandated by state and county policy. They don’t get to pick or choose the students assigned to their classes. Student apathy and entitlement have become the rules, not the exceptions. Lack of pride and accomplishment among students is becoming prevalent in our classrooms today. Would you like to get paid based on that criteria?
>Max
That would imply an entry and exit exam-works for me.
SW, I would suggest that they measure each child’s performance and compare it to the previous years. You have to compare apples to apples and oranges to oranges. You simply can NOT expect this years students to be evaluated compared to how last years students performed in the same grade level. The grade level may be the same but the students most definitely are not.
Don’t count on students with disabilities not being evaluated the same as other students. It would make sense to evaluate students with disabilities differently, but remember this is the government we are talking about here, they are well known to for not doing things that make sense.
Then how do you evaluate teacher performance?
Like I said, standardized testing is not the best way; what is the best way?
Surely, students with disabilities and special needs aren’t evaluated the same as others on standardized testing.
It is fine to hold someone accountable for their performance but when you have students that can’t do well on a test because of disabilities or they are daydreaming or just don’t want to then it is not fair to the teacher.
Gee, we wouldn’t want to hold anyone accountable for their performance or tie that performance to pay or to their job security.
It’s all about the union taking care of itself.
Granted, standardized testing is not the best gauge, but is there one better?
Kinda like the old joke about being paid what you’re worth and not being able to work that cheap, maybe?
i’m so glad we did not come to Florida!!!!
Wonderful, so now they want a standardized test at the beginning of the year, FCAT in the middle and another standardized one at the end of the year. I think our government officials need to worry about cleaning their own messes up rather than micro managing the local school districts. Education starts in the home and you can’t lay all the responsibility on the teachers.
I certainly do not agree with this. As stated in a couple of the posts, teacher pay should not be determined by student performance. I work very hard to teach my students and some of them choose not to learn even when the parent (father) comes to the school and sit with him. Unfortunately, some of them think that their parents or someone else will take care of them forever which is not true! Currently, I am using powerpoints to teach them instead of the book. Also, we do activities to help them to learn instead of worksheets (that I still use at times). As far as the ESE students are concerned, they have a disability that requires the curriculum to be differentiated so they can learn. Plus, their scores on FCAT count three times…why??? Not to mention, having to differentiate the curriculum for the gen ed. students! In contrast to what teachers earn compared to other careers is not the half of it! This will be terrible if it is passed!
Soon there will be no one crazy enough to go to college to become a teacher, then what will we do? Spend a day in a classroom with certain students so out of control that they keep the teacher busy trying to control them and the parents do nothing and dont care. On top of that teachers not only have to teach the stuff in the books but teach all the stuff the parents will not teach. I agree with having a scale to award excellent teachers and not award teachers who do a bad job. I do not think all teachers should get the same raise because where would the drive be to be great at your job and it does not encourage other teachers to improve.
FYI I am not a teacher but I am at the school enough to see the problems!
Just saying…
Yeah?
I’ve got a name for a recipe, and I’m sure it will win the Pillsbury Bake-Off Grand Prize. I don’t know what’s in it, and I’ve never attempted to make anything that sounds like it would have this recipes name, though. But it’s a winner!
The education support people are waiting for a raise. I understand this will come when the wording of the contract is agreed upon.
We are waiting for a raise now. The wording of the contract is not being agreed upon.
Would this not also drive the good teachers to the high performing schools? Why struggle with inner city or rural kids when you could choose a better school with a better shot at a raise?
For some of those public assistance, maybe we should tie the amount of their assistance to how well their child(ren) do in school. Maybe that way, they would make an effort to involve themselves with the child’s education.
If they tie teacher pay to bonuses, pay raises, etc., is it any wonder the principals pressure the teachers and the teachers pressure the kids so much to do well on the FCAT? The kids are sitting there taking these tests and the teachers might be thinking, “Will I be able to make my mortgage payments/car payments, buy bread and milk, etc. if Little Johnny/Janie/Jamal/Lakeisha/Juan…..doesn’t do well on the FCAT, etc.” Teachers work hard every day, but they have a pretty good idea which students in their classes won’t test well or have the passing grades and will be retained.
The old saying, You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink. Applys to our children when it comes to education. You can’t make them learn. But you can bet they will know how to text, run a pc, dvd, cd player, or xbox.
Teacher have to fight getting feed up with trying to teach children who only disrupt and cause trouble. Teacher are only human not miracle workers.
Special education teachers will be hurt the most I fear. The children in their classrooms will never be as smart as the average child because they have learning disabilities and so many strikes against them from day one. These teachers will be penalized and not receive bonuses, etc even though they are some of the hardest working teachers in the school system.
Very well said NOTE… I agree…
Well– that will help eliminate raises for teachers. When will those who are not in the classroom understand students are human beings, not products on an assembly line? Just because little Johnny and Susie are capable doesn’t mean they will excel to their capabilities–no matter how what the teacher tries. More government control.