Looking at performance-based pay in a new way

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Many Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools teachers are in a bad mood this week, and it’s no wonder why: Superintendent Peter Gorman is talking again about messing with their salaries.

Gorman is giving many teachers heartburn with his visiting of the idea of performance-based pay. It’s only a proposal at this point, with talk of it being rolled out in 2014 and details still being worked out. But, in a nutshell, it would mean more compensation for top-performing teachers, while those who don’t meet performance standards would not get raises. Substandard teachers also would not get a pay cut, a point Gorman found himself clarifying this week to quell some of the uproar.

I used to be adamantly opposed to the idea of giving teachers automatic raises every year. I used to think that teachers should be treated like private-sector employees, that they should get paid more only if they deserved it, that they should be happy they get so many days off.

I was a bitter little man back then, wasn’t I?

Now, I’m not so sure about tying teacher pay to performance. Now, the idea troubles me, makes me a little itchy.

Why the change of heart?

Perhaps it’s because of concerns that teachers who are paid based on students’ test scores might “teach to the test.” I worry that anything that a teacher doesn’t expect to be on a standardized test won’t be taught. That could mean less time for classroom discussions or debates, less time for creativity. Goodbye, show and tell. See you later, field trips to the zoo.

Having two children who one day will go to school makes me see these concerns, which I’m not the first to raise, through a different set of eyes.

I don’t think I want my children sitting in a classroom where rote absorption of facts is the model for teaching. I feel a bit queasy about my children not being exposed to art or music or hands-on projects because they won’t help them pass a standardized test. I want my children to go on field trips, which were the source of some of my fondest school memories.

But when teachers are worried that they won’t get a raise if their students perform poorly on standardized tests, they’re more likely to resort to rote memorization and sticking to only those lessons that prepare students for the tests. It’s only natural that they will spend less time on lessons that won’t help students pass the tests.

And can you blame teachers who would do that? I mean, these are their raises we’re talking about. Who doesn’t like a raise? (Note to people born since the Great Recession began: A raise is an increase in salary an employee gets from his or her employer, usually once a year.)

So, it’s true: Having kids changes a person. And, on the issue of whether teachers should be paid based on performance, I guess my opinion has changed, or at least I’m not as much of a supporter of performance-based pay for teachers as I used to be.

Of course, I might change my mind back the first time my kids come home with some dumb homework assignment.

Editor Deon Roberts can be reached at [email protected].