Taking Issue: Merit Pay

TAKING ISSuE

read the following brief introduction, as well as the Question and the pros and cons list that follows. then, answer the question using your own words and position.

merIt pay

traditionally, teachers have earned salaries based on their years in teaching and their highest degree obtained. recent alternative pay plans, however, offer rewards to teachers considered above average in teaching skills or increasing student achievement as measured on achievement tests.

Question

Should individual teachers receive special pay increases based on “merit”? (think about this question as you read the PrO and COn arguments listed here. what is your response to this issue?)

Arguments PRO

1. teachers whose students consistently score high on assessments must be outstanding teachers. Such teachers merit extra compensation for their work. 2. A growing body of research suggests that individual teachers can impact a student’s learning. if such statistical evidence exists, teachers should be rewarded for positive student performance.

3. Performance-pay programs encourage teachers to focus on teaching the established curriculum because that is what the assessments are designed to measure. this ensures that students throughout the district are learning the same information and skills. 4. without opportunities to earn performance pay, capable and ambitious people will choose incentive-producing careers such as business; thus, the best candidates will not be attracted to teaching, and high-quality teachers will be inclined to leave teaching. 5. Merit pay promotes excellence in teaching by acting as an incentive for teachers to improve their performance.

Each teacher is encouraged to develop better teaching behaviors to increase student performance. Business and most other professions offer such motivators, so why not teaching?

Arguments CON

1. Factors related to achievement are so diverse that it is impossible to differentiate the teacher’s contribution from home, social-class, and peer-group influences. 2. At this time, pay-for-performance plans only reward teachers in the core subject areas because that is what is currently being assessed. hard work can perhaps be measured, but many creative activities do not necessarily correlate with good teaching. if creativity is a criterion, merit pay may be rewarded more for the teacher’s apparent inventiveness than for students’ learning. 3. if student results on mandated assessments are the primary evidence of performance, teachers will only teach to the test, thus narrowing the educational experience for students.

4. Businesses can offset extensive merit pay rewards by raising prices, but schools must rely on taxes. taxpayers often will not or cannot support financial incentives significant enough to support a fair merit-pay system.

5. incentive pay, by definition, goes to only a few. Such a plan penalizes equally qualified teachers who miss out for lack of enough positions. Moreover, competition for merit pay pits one teacher against another, encourages political games, and destroys the collegial cooperation essential to good education.

Question Reprise: What is Your Stand?

reflect again on the following question by explaining your stand about this issue: Should individual teachers receive special pay increases based on merit or performance?

Even as arguments continue, performance-pay plans are being implemented in school districts across the United States. The Obama administration is supporting these efforts through its requirement under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) that state education agencies implement teacher and principal evaluation and support systems that use multiple measures of performance, including student growth