7 Comments

Yet another example of industry trying to turn education into dollars and cents. Standardized testing and merit based incomes is nothing new in American education and it still hasn’t worked.

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Yes, well said, Danya.

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Some great points here. It would be nice if all the folks (tech bros, philanthropists, politicians, armchair pundits, etc.) who have the "solution" to education problems could actually spend some time as teacher's aides or running some sort of educational programming so they could see the many challenges teachers overcome on a daily basis

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Agreed. I don't think the idea of merit-based pay for teachers can survive significant time in the classroom. Student learning is incredibly complex and based on many factors beyond the teacher.

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This is why one Flying Circus Orchestra mantra is "Be a Music Teacher, not a Band Director." Although they can be lumped together, there is a fine difference. Music Teachers care about the general well-being of kids and make learning fun, but they are not paid enough. Band Directors see kids as money and profit and get all their resources from DCI, BOA, and NAMM met.

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What a completely backwards, anti-logic approach to the problem. "Oh, this teacher is producing losers and this teacher is producing winners? Promote and compensate them equally!" This is why the DoE needs to be dissolved and the Teachers' Union seriously investigated. No institution that is run like this can achieve its goals and when the goal is producing students capable of surviving in the labor market, failure is not an option. I hope Pres. Trump axes the DoE and drops the hammer on the Union. The failure needs to end.

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How would you handle the problems with merit-based pay that I described here?

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