Determining Merit Pay
As a college student who is to begin student teaching next fall, I have begun to take more and more interest in what it is you plan to do in regards to your education policy for the United States. I just wanted to say that I too am in favor of Merit Pay for teachers that are deserving of it, but I feel certain steps need to be taken to ensure the policy is a successful one that teachers all across the nation can find acceptable. In America those who work harder and do their job better are suppose to be compensated appropriately for their effort. This is not the case in the teaching field and it is not until we solve this issue that the field of teaching will be marred with those who are being paid the same as those who go above and beyond the call for their students. By far the most notable issue with Merit Pay is determining which teachers deserve it. The use of testing can not be the main format for determining a teacher’s ability in much the same reasons as testing is controversial with No Child Left Behind. There needs to be many different factors in determining a teacher’s ability not simply test scores. The one factor I feel that needs to be associated with Merit Pay is student evaluations. The goal of teaching is to better educate our youth and provide them with the resources necessary for them to be successful in life outside of school. Because of this I feel it is imperative that students be allowed to evaluate their teachers the same way that students in college are allowed. From this administrators can better determine how successful the teacher is in their classroom as they are able to discern from the students how effective the teacher is in providing the students an education. Of course this can not only be the only measure taken to determine Merit Pay as issues of favoritism can emerge and thus disrupt the accuracy of the tests. That is why I also feel that it is important to have an outside group or company be brought in to also perform evaluations and measure the students’ abilities. This would help to alleviate issues of favoritism as the outside group would not be connected to the teacher in any way and thus help promote fairness and equality in an issue that is often surrounded by negativity. These two actions I feel would be very instrumental in helping to bring about the nation wide use of Merit Pay, and thus help better reward those teachers who have gone above and beyond the call of their job for so many years. These teachers have gone for years without being properly rewarded for their hard work and effort, but still they continue to put forth a hundred and ten percent in their jobs because they love their job and educating our children. It is time for these teachers to be properly acknowledged for their excellent service in educating our nation.
This post was submitted by Andrew Reynolds.
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