Among the complex mix of factors affecting effective teaching considered here on Teach Effectively, teachers’ unions is one of several we’ve not discussed. I don’t consider this post to be a thorough analysis of the topic; it’s just observations about one consideration in promoting effective teaching: The role of teachers’ unions in relation to merit or performance pay. Teachers’ unions are a ready target for some groups, and one of the favored concerns is how teachers unions, in the view of some, resist efforts to tie pay to student performance.
Steve Lopez, a top journalist who writes for the Los Angeles Times, is wading into this topic. He found a case of a first-year teacher, Susan Requa, who was not re-hired, despite glowing recommendations from Ron Harris, her supervisor at James Monroe High School in the San Fernando Valley section of LA. In the belt-tightening that most people and agencies are having to undergo in the current economic situation, Ms. Requa had too little seniority to receive a renewal from the local education agency that employed her for the 2008-09 academic year. Mr. Lopez is planning to talk with A. J. Duffy, who is the head of United Teachers Los Angeles, about Mr. Requa’s case and the matter of seniority.
The reasons I’ve gone into this detail are several, including that Mr. Lopez is a writer whom I think deserves the many accolades he’s received and because it’s just an interesting story. But a very important reason is that Mr. Harris made comments to Mr. Lopez that I’d like to reiterate. Here’s Mr. Lopez’s account of part of his conversation with Mr. Harris:
When I shared with Harris that Duffy has told me there’s no proven system for fairly evaluating teachers and that the tenure system protects good teachers who might get pushed around by bad principals, he scoffed.
“What I’d love to say to Duffy is that there has to be a way to judge good teaching, and we as a union should get out in front of that instead of pretending that it can never happen,” Harris said.
The first statement—there’s no proven system—that Mr. Lopez attributes to Mr. Duffy is almost certainly true. Educational researchers haven’t really tested merit-pay systems thoroughly. The second statement, Mr. Harris’ assertion that unions should engage in the policy making, is a debatable assertion, and I’ll side with him on the importance of teachers speaking up in the discussion. What better source than their unions is there for teachers to speak clearly and forthrightly as professionals exercising leadership about their profession?
Of course (where’s my hobbyhorse?), I hope that teachers speak up for the importance of having use of evidence-based practices as a part of determining merit. However, the critical feature in any equation has to be student outcomes. Although it will require some careful modeling, employing student learning in judging teachers’ performance.
According to Mr. Lopez, Mr. Harris resisted using student outcomes, “because then all teachers would try to transfer to schools with higher achieving students.” Resistance to a simplistic system would probably have undesirable consequences, perhaps including those that Mr. Harris envisions. However, it’s certainly possible to create an understandable and minimally game-able system. Just off the top of my head: Instead of absolute student scores, how about using year-over-year growth, perhaps compared with growth previously and by other teachers’ students? Add bonus points for taking on the toughest assignments. If teachers consistently show that the students they teach experience “learning spurts,” especially with students from hard-to-teach demographics, I’d vote for reinforcing their teaching behaviors. How about a base salary with bonuses based on something like this?
Link to Mr. Lopez’ column. I’m looking forward to his report about the meeting.
| Side note about union leadership: Oh to have Al Shanker in the mix at this time. He wasn’t revered by everyone, but I thought he took some rational and courageous stands during his time with the American Federation of Teachers. I hope Randi Weingarten and John Wilson can rise to his level of contributions. |
More on teachers’ unions and merit pay:
- The US National Education Association’s “Fact Sheet on NEA’s views regarding mandated performance pay for educators“;
- Douglas Hartman and Rob Weil of the American Federation of Teachers on “Developing a Performance Pay Plan for Teachers: A Process, Not an Event“;
- Washington Post’s Jay Mathews on “Merit Pay Could Ruin Teacher Teamwork” and “Charter Schools Provide Good Model On Teacher Pay“;
- Hoover Institution’s Bill Evers What Exactly Is the Stand of Teachers’ Unions on Merit Pay?;
- The Educator Compensation Institute’s resources;
- Previous entries from TE with relevant comments by Arne Duncan, US Secretary of Education, appeared 8 June 2009 and 2 July 2009.
I read your article with great interest. In my last two blog entries, I expressed my doubts that a fair and practical merit-pay system could be developed. But the suggestions you offered are intriguing and logical. I hope the politicians and teachers unions consider such valid and valuable input when discussing the issue of merit pay.
Any merit pay plan has to take into account the reality that teachers cooperating with each other is better for students than teachers competing with each other. When we start to look at the importance of collaboration, among general ed teachers and with specialists such as Special Ed. and ESL, the whole merit pay thing gets murky rather quickly. I’d much rather see strong enforcement of provisions already present in teacher contracts which help poor teachers improve or show them the door. Teachers unions are there to protect teachers’ due process rights, not to protect poor teachers.
Mary, you’re right that we don’t need competition between teachers. Collaboration is critical. In fact, educators (i.e., “we”) need to collaborate and help each other to employ the practices, procedures, methods, and approaches that produce better outcomes for our students. That requires, to be sure, fair outcome measures, tests that accurately assess the competencies “we” and our clients (parents and businesses) agree are important.
If we educators would help ineffective teachers to employ effective methods, that’d be wonderful. If some teachers can’t or won’t employ effective methods, then we educators should, indeed, “show them the door.” I support teacher’ unions when they take this sort of stance. I think AFT and A. Shanker showed “we” educators the path when they argued for, for example, evidence-based early reading instruction. The AFT may have done some other things that are less helpful (and some good things, such as hiring Dan Willingham to write a column), but the leadership on early reading was an example of doing it the right way.