Teachers’ pay should be based on performance, not years worked: report

Just about everything. Randi is almost totally responsible for bringing teachers around to new evaluation methods and is a proponent of Common Core. In fact, the AFT spent four years negotiating a new evaluation system in Pittsburgh that's been widely hailed as a model. The current dispute is about where to set the "failing" benchmark. The school superintendent wants the bar set at a level at which nine percent of teachers would have a "failing" rating. At some point there will be a compromise on the number. And the $40 million grant has already been in effect for a long time. There's a little over $15 million left.

 

Here's a question: How do you evaluate the performance of a special education teacher, or are we going to simply pay cap these people because, you know, fuck them?

 

Of course, there are plenty more where they came from. You can hire some mooks off the Mickey D. drive-thru line any old day.


It's also to be noted that one of the primary characteristics of the plans under consideration is not any specific improvement in student performance, but a specific percentage of teachers to be gotten rid of.

 

Thank you, cran. I didn't know much about the specific situation, but the characterization of Weingarten sounded particularly unfair. I've heard her speak locally about some of the issues with educational reforms in New York, including the problem with protecting student privacy that I mentioned earlier. She certainly came off as a passionate defender of education and of teachers, but not an unreasonable one.

She fits into the category of those in education who see the benefits in the Common Core, but understand that you can support while still taking the New York State Education Department to task for its piss-poor implementation of the new standards.

 

I am always amused (well, not really) and amazed (well, not really either) when people go berserk claiming, "teachers' unions only care about the welfare of teachers."

Well, no shit, Sherlock.

Think about it and in terms of the educational process, you have several different constituencies:

1) Teachers' unions

2) Professional administrative staff

3) Parents

4) Students

5) District citizens/taxpayers

6) Governmental institutional officials



Of those six groups, only ONE has the interests of students strictly in mind (of course, the group with the least direct power).


One of the other five groups has their interests as a high priority. For the other four, it's incidental in varying degree. But none of them have the welfare of students as their paramount priority.

 

I would submit to being paid based on performance, but we need to clarify/fine tune what good performance is. High test scores from schools in socially challenged areas shouldn't be the only criteria.