Thursday, April 19, 2012
Harrison School District 2 in Colorado Springs is taking an assertive step towards reforming education. The have adopted what they call the Pay-For-Performance-Plan. In a nut shell, as a teacher you are evaluated throughout the year. The progress you show as a teacher, and that your students show in learning is what determines whether you have a job the next year and what your salary will be. It is assertive, but may be the incentive we need to crack down on teachers not showing interest in bettering themselves and their lessons. Check out the website and let me know your thoughts. The only thing that bothers me, is that it is sad that money has to be thrown out to encourage teachers to do their job. http://www.hsd2.org/departments/curriculum-instruction/er-teacher-pay-performance-plan
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Hopefully something good comes out of this, but I also am concerned about throwing money at a problem. Daniel Pink, author of Drive and researcher on all things motivation, has described the overwhelming evidence that things like this can't be improved by incentives. Teaching is incredibly complex, and performance when incentives are offered with these kinds of tasks goes down rather than up. The "merit pay" debate is often fueled by businesses, who simply don't get what it takes to educate children and don't appreciate the complexity and difficulty of the job of a teacher.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the insight Andy, I had never thought about it like that, but it makes sense now that I stop and think about it. I truly think a department/committee should be created to work with teachers when they are having trouble or have found themselves in a rut. This committee could also work on ways to continually motivate teachers, to bring out the and passion that some teachers have lost....
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