Posted on 07/16/2018 6:24:57 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Compensation of most US public school teachers is rigid and determined solely on the basis of seniority. This paper examines the effects of a major change in laws regulating teacher salaries. In 2011, the State of Wisconsin’s Act 10 gave school districts full authority to design their own independent compensation schemes for teachers. Newly collected data on district-level policies show that roughly half of all districts retained seniority-based schedules, whereas the other half switched to flexible compensation and started paying high-quality teachers more. Teacher quality (measured using test scores) increased by 0.05 standard deviations in districts with flexible pay relative to those that retained the rigid compensation structure. This change was driven primarily by high-quality teachers moving into flexible-pay districts and low-quality teachers leaving these districts. Teachers’ effort also increased by 0.07 standard deviations in flexible-pay districts compared with seniority-pay districts. Simulations based on a structural model of this labor market show that the introduction of individual salaries in all districts (as opposed to just a few) is associated with a smaller improvement in teacher quality, entirely attributable to exits of low-quality teachers.
(Excerpt) Read more at newyorkfed.org ...
Five one hundredths of a standard deviation isnt very much
Unkind, being the last hope of the hopelessly incompetent, are aghast at this. They believe that seniority should determine eveerthjng. If unions are so about quality—the union card is our guarantee of quality—why aren’t the most senior people the most productive? The ones with the fewest errors?
“The reform was passed under governor Scott Walker. “
And the unions and the Rars tried to recall hm.
So much of education happens at home. If mommy and daddy aren’t working with the kids at home then all the schooling in the world won’t be effective.
IIR my stats courses, that's not a lot. Not sure test scores can change quickly (may require multi-year curriculum overhaul).
Wow, what a concept.
A friend just took a job teaching construction skills to prison inmates as part of a pre-release program.
He’s expected by the educational cabal to become a certified teacher and has 4-5 years to attain a Masters degree.
Since he had done a couple jobs for us, we had to provide documentation that he’s an actual carpenter, as if 20 years in the business wasn’t enough.
The other day, he had to go to the state education department to complete some paperwork. There was a large 200 space lot for VIP parking that he wasn’t allowed to join the other three cars and had to find street parking.
What an absolute joke.
Sorry, but until they fix the illegal invasion issue, judging any teacher against test score lacks value and intelligence.
Agree. The pay scheme was one variable, with the curriculum being constant.
Want to see real improvement? Couple a rational curriculum with competent teachers. Compare that to the status quo.
Aaaaaand of course the NEA will have NONE OF THAT!
“Five one hundredths of a standard deviation isnt very much”
a) it’s a change in the right direction
b) I’m not going to say that five-one-hundredths of a standard deviation is the same as a 5% change, but if you gave the best teachers a percentage pay differential based on that value, with a national average teacher salary of about $60,000/year, a 5% raise would be about $3,000 - I suspect the better teachers would approve.
If average is 80% and that standard d3viation goes up to 88%, then the improvement took the score up to 80.4%.
That can be easily explained just by teaching to the test since that’s how teachers are being rated. Mere emphasis on test familiarity could explain it. Iow, not more education. Just better at hitting buttons correctly.
In our area of small schools, just the addition of one low functioning family can lessen scores for a graduating class of about 80. Iow, statistical anomaly
I was thinking the same thing. Statistical noise. In fairness, the time for results of such policy to really be measurable would be fairly long so overall I find this study to be 'meh'.
If you look at the statistics on page 36 the results are rather mixed, with some students doing better in flexible pay districts and some doing better in fixed pay districts. All in all, the paper seems to find benefit for teachers and not necessarily for the students.
Because if you pay teachers by test scores, then the teachers who get the ESL and Special Ed students will get screwed no matter how good they are, and the teachers who get the Honors classes will get rewarded, no matter how bad they are.
That is perfectly true.
In Ohio the iep student gets assigned by the state an average score no matter how low it really is.
The school district gets assigned by the state an average score no matter how low it really is.
The teacher gets assigned the real score no matter how low it is.
It’s bureaucratic insanity.
Yep. As a teacher, I know I’m the whipping boy for all the failures of parents, admin, and society. Two more years and I can retire. I’ll always do my best, but I can’t say I’m going to go on much longer.
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