Teach Effectively!

According to a report issued by a group called “Teacher Leaders Network,” which characterizes itself as “an active community of talented teacher leaders from across the nation, dedicated to student success and the transformation of teaching into a true profession,” teachers are willing to support plans that tie teachers’ pay to levels of student performance. There appear to be a lot of conditions for this stance from what I have read, though.

First, here’s the rhetoric:

Teachers will support performance-pay plans that advance student achievement and the teaching profession, says a first-of-its-kind report written by a diverse group of expert teachers from across the United States. The new TeacherSolutions[sm] study proposes radical changes in the way teachers have traditionally been compensated, including:

• Rewarding small teams of teachers who raise student achievement together;

• Rewarding teachers who accept challenging assignments in high-needs schools and strengthen connections between school and community; and

• Redesigning pay systems so that teacher success, not seniority or graduate degrees, determines maximum teacher pay.

The report proposes that teachers’ base pay still be tied to experience, but it suggests that “teachers could earn more through a variety of incentives as they progress from ‘novice’ to ‘expert.’” It recommends that successful teachers split their time between teaching students and coaching other teachers. The rub seems to be in how one determines which teachers advance to what the report identifies as “hybrid roles.” It recommends against plans that pay extra to teachers who based on “too narrow” test scores; instead the authors advocate “plans that measure student gains of time.”

But, these are only a couple of aspects of the report. Read the entire thing yourself and tell what you think about it. The site of the Teacher Leaders Network—which is affiliated with the Center for Teaching Quality—includes connections to lots of other sources, including blogs called “Teacher Voices” and “Teacher Leadership Today“and other resources.