Nearly a month ago now, Robert Reich wrote on his blog
If teachers want higher salaries, the unions are going to have to accept merit pay. Indeed, that's the whole point. Great teacher should be generously rewarded. But that also means lousy ones should be sacked.
This isn't just a bad idea, it's bad policy and it would ultimately leave a great many children behind as the best teachers fought over the best students. Like the rest of NCLB, such imprudent policy would set the stage for the wholesale destruction of the public education system. (At the point where every school is expected to have 100% of students at or above grade level in order to pass even one failing student means the entire school, and ultimately the entire system, fails. Even private schools who get to choose who they teach can't get 100%).
But why is 'merit pay' such a bad idea?
First we must be clear that there is no universally accepted idea of what is meritorious in a teacher. To put it another way; it is possible for a teacher to follow the proscribed curriculum, use the best teaching methods, engage students in their work, draw in the community and still have students that cannot pass the test. I'd like to think that I've always been a good student but put me in an Ancient French Literature class and I wouldn't have a hope to succeed since I can neither speak nor read French at all... But would that be my fault as a student? Is it my parents' faults because they never thought to have me learn archaic French dialects? Or, as Reich would have us believe, is it the fault of the teacher?
To quote from an essay I penned this last year while pursuing my master's degree in education:
Imagine a car salesman. Like anyone who works in sales, he must be held accountable for his ability to meet his quota; let us presume that he must sell thirty of the forty cars in his inventory per month. If he meets the quota he does well. If he exceeds it he gets a raise. If he fails to meet the quota, management singles him out for special assistance. If he continues to fail, he is transferred or fired. This does not seem terribly unjust; indeed, this seems to be common practice in industry. Imagine, however, that only four of his cars can reach their top speed. Four cannot run at all and at least one does not even have an engine. Another eight are missing at least one tire and most are missing at least one component that may—or may not—affect how well the cars run. Amongst the cars that do run, several have manuals that were not written in English and no translations can be found. None of them look or sound as good as the cars at the wealthier dealership. Given that, would we still expect our intrepid salesman to be able to make his quota? If he could not, is it still his fault?
We may not like the conclusions that this seems to bring us to. Our children can't be defective can they? Teach for even a day in a public school (not one of the few remaining wealthy white bastions of yuppiedom for preference) and see if you don't ask yourself, "What's wrong with that kid?" at least once. I love all the children that I teach but I do not labor under the delusion that they will all be rocket-scientists. If I'm lucky, they'll all be legally employed. Period. To assume that every child who goes to school is destined for college is no different from assuming that every child who dribbles a basketball should play in the NBA or that every four-year-old who finger paints will one day have work hanging in the Museum of Modern Art. The beauty of the system lies, not in guaranteeing a quantifiable level of education, but in providing the opportunity for education; your student could be destined for NASA, MoMA or the NBA. Given enough time, I could even learn ancient French - but don't hold it against my teacher if it takes me a while.