Paying our teachers
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f you want to start a fight with public school teachers, go to a faculty meeting and shout "Merit pay rocks!"
Teacher unions and their memberships have traditionally opposed the idea. No, "opposed" isn't the right word -- "hated" is more accurate.
Despite this, reports The New York Times, merit pay is on the move in many states. And hard as it may be to believe, some teacher unions are actually working with legislatures to craft the programs.
We mention this because education is always topic No. 1 in Utah -- the spring and summer debate has been over vouchers, but a few months ago it was teacher salaries and classroom spending. Couple this perennial wrangling with news that the Legislature will have an expected $160 million to $260 million budget surplus to deal with when they convene for their next regular session in January, and we think some of those millions could be allocated for a Utah teacher merit-pay program.
We are not suggesting that Utah's teachers are doing a lousy job. Far from it; just the other day we remarked in this space about Utah leading the nation in high school graduation rates. It's plain to see Utah teachers are experts at wringing the maximum amount of education out of meager state resources -- Utah spends the least per student on education than any state in the country.
But it has also become obvious that there is a growing segment of vocal Utahns who believe the status quo isn't cutting it. Over the past several years, the charter school movement has gained significant momentum, and now school choice/vouchers are gaining traction.
We are, indeed, such passionate supporters of public education that we believe it would be perilous for Utah's public schools to ignore opportunities for strengthening our traditional public schools. One way to accomplish that may be a form of merit pay for top-performing teachers.
Utah lawmakers have flirted with the idea before -- for example, specifically targeting teachers in certain disciplines like math and science for additional pay. And Gov. Huntsman said last week that hiking teachers' pay is his No. 1 budget priority.
We like what The Times' story says about the current merit pay program in Minnesota, which teacher union officials helped to craft: Teachers in some Minneapolis schools work with mentors to improve their skills, and in turn hike student performance. The combination of these and other aspects result in better schools and higher teacher pay.
We believe as lawmakers and teachers look for ways to further improve public education in the Beehive State, merit pay should be one avenue of investigation and discussion.
The two groups are unfortunately at odds most of the time, but working together on this issue might help to bring them together, and to make schools even better in the process.
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