Most other professional jobs are rewarded with pay for performance. Lawyers earn more when they win cases and stock brokers get bonuses if they invest your money well (or recently, even if they invest is poorly, but I digress). We even think that we can judge the intangible qualities of what makes our restaurant experience a good one, and tip our waitress accordingly. Teaching is the only profession I can think of where mediocrity and complacency are actually rewarded. When I look out on the sea of teachers out there, I see some that are worth following. But I also see some who I would never wish to emulate. If two of those teachers, the good and the bad, have been there the same number of years and have the same level of education, they get the same pay. Just intuitively, that doesn't make any sense to me.
I like to think that I am good at my job. But I won't deny thinking on more than one occasion, "Why should I go to the extra effort to do this? Its not like it will affect me in any way." I believe that in my short time in the classroom, that this idea has even crossed my mind shows the one reason we need a merit pay system. Because honestly, why should any teacher go above and beyond in their classroom? Right now the only motivation I can think of is to gain the professional respect of their peers, and that can only motivate a person so much. "But it's for the children," you might exclaim. "We go above and beyond for them!" While that may be true for some teachers, I think that in all honesty we can't (and shouldn't have to be) that idealistic. Of course many teachers go into teaching because they love children and want to improve their lives. But there are other motivations to teach that may not carry such an implicit desire to excel. Really, its a disgrace that we as a county ask teachers to do their jobs 'despite the pay'. I don't ask my veterinarians to do their job out of the pure love of my cat; it surely helps that they love my animal, but all I really ask is that they provide a good service for a just price. I think that is what we should reasonably ask of our educators.
My own major criticism of merit pay systems lays not with the principal, but with what would inevitably become the practice - rewarding teachers based on test scores. But in truth, I believe strongly that we could design a system that even I would be comfortable with in this area. I dislike the idea of rewarding based solely on test scores for all the usual reasons (and at least one lesser mentioned reason). Test scores are partly out of the teacher's control. Even if they taught well, a student might have an argument with their parents on the morning of the test and not be focused for it. Furthermore, special education students and students who are not proficient in English historically have a difficult time with standardized tests, even if know the material very well.
But I take issue with pay for performance on test scores for anther, less mentioned, reason as well. I know that recently I was listening to a colleague talk about a pay-for-performance pilot program they were taking part in. She was a Kindergarten teacher, and a dedicated one. She loved her students, her job and took a great deal of pride in how she was able to take a child who didn't know the alphabet at the beginning of the year and have them reading above grade level at the end of the year. But after she listened to the explanation of the system she was about to pilot, she told me "There's nothing in it for me." Why, I wondered, would this system not reward this excellent teacher? Kindergarten isn't a state testing grade. She felt (justifiably) slighted.
I think the first step toward creating a successful pay for performance system is to put aside this idea that one teacher can really control the test scores of each child. Education isn't a one-on-one battle; it really takes a community. The third grader who takes their first MSA isn't showing what they learned in third grade - they're showing a progression, that they've been learning all along. Some of our most important teaching is done before students are even tested, in early childhood. A successful merit pay system would address this and reward those teachers as well. I believe that every teacher should be rewarded if the school as a whole does well. No one teacher does it alone. It takes support and growth throughout all the grades.
I think that most teachers scoff at the idea of a merit pay system not because they are afraid to be paid based on their performance, but because they don't believe their performance will be judged fairly. I believe this system could have enormous benefits. I would never be sitting in my classroom thinking, "Why should I go to the extra effort? It's not worth my time." Even on my worst day I know it is worth my time. Maybe someone else just needs to recognize that as well.
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