Welcome Guest
[Log In]
[Register]
| Welcome to Our Hoosier Board! Most of the posters here have been around for nearly a decade now. You'll find their knowledge and insight to be second to none. We have a really strong community and value everyone's opinions. Feel free to jump into any thread and voice your opinion with conviction. We love heated debates and even some fanbase ribbing from time to time. We pride ourselves on the lack of moderation needed to make this board successful. Please remember that we have been around many years and have an astute ability to tell the difference between an immature, childish, trash-talking troll and a passionate fan voicing his or her opinion. It is at the discretion of Jazen and myself whether any moderating actions should be taken at any given time. It's a very, very rare thing. In other words, no worries....you'll be fine! Cheers, sirbrianwilson Join our community! If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features: |
| Business question | |
|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Jul 1 2009, 02:07 AM (381 Views) | |
| boilergrad01 | Jul 1 2009, 05:13 PM Post #16 |
|
Working on the last 5
|
Hmmm I always believed teachers cared more about kids than money. Teaching is different from manufacturing and the service industry. This is not apples to apples. |
| Nothing beats an Astronaut | |
![]() |
|
| yawnzzz | Jul 1 2009, 05:27 PM Post #17 |
|
Coach
|
I don't see a problem with it. Teacher's should be paid on their accomplishments, and there's only so much money to go around, so they can't exactly give everyone a $5,000 bonus if they raise their kids two grade levels unless they want to go broke. Schools are going to use their best teachers to train their worst. Inbetween school's, superintendents and such might not be so willing to have training seminars, but I don't know how much of that goes on anyways. I do agree with Boilergrad as well. The teachers I had that were great would've taught for free, so I don't think this will affect the majority. |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 05:27 PM Post #18 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
Don't know about you, but my mortage doesn't get paid with kids. But I guess since I teach, I should put my students before my family, huh? And it's time to wake up: teachers didn't turn education into an industry -- the government and NCLB did. Schools have become standardized-test taking factories (and don't think that is only particular to public schools only). You are completely avoiding the issue with this line of thinking. Doctors are in it for the patients, right? Should we drop their pay down to $7.50 an hour then? I care as much for the students I have as any teacher I know. But if you tell me that our school district will not recieve as much funding if other schools improve more than we do, should I share information with them that will increase their student's learning at the expense of ours? I would hope to hell that you want teachers that are fighting for your corporation's students. |
| |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 05:41 PM Post #19 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
I think it's time to wake up. You will see teachers within a corporation help each other...but you WILL NOT see teachers help teachers in another corporation help pne another if it means less money not only to them but additionally to their corporation's way. What's funny to me is that pretty much everyone agreed that businesses shouldn't give trade secrets away yet when it comes to teachers...well, they are different. I care as much about students as anyone I know, but I will never understand the mindset of people who feel that teacher's don't deserve to even consider monetary factors. |
| |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 05:45 PM Post #20 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
BTW, if the only concern was for kids, what would the need for monetary incentives be? |
| |
![]() |
|
| HoosierLars | Jul 1 2009, 05:52 PM Post #21 |
![]()
3 in a row
|
And a discussion of teacher merit pay doesn't belong in the "business question" thread. Giving a bloated bureaucratic agency like the state teachers' administration the authority to come up with some contrived method of diving out "merit pay" just isn't going to work. It has no more of a chance than giving Barrack and friends control over Detroit and expecting better cars to be built. On the other hand, allowing multiple schools to compete with each other to produce the best educational product and earn the dollars of millions of parents could logically be put under the title "Business question". |
| |
![]() |
|
| yawnzzz | Jul 1 2009, 06:07 PM Post #22 |
|
Coach
|
You're just looking at flaws in the business mindset instead of solutions. If your school is suffering and another school is doing great, then try to hire their best teachers away. If you can't hire them to teach, then hire them to do training seminars. If their school doesn't want them to do that, then hire the best retired teachers to do training seminars. |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 06:08 PM Post #23 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
Jesus, you're touchy. I was honestly asking you to bring it up in a separate thread for discussion....I wasn't saying another about the value of the statement. I wanted this thread to stay focused on the specific issue of merit pay as I know that quite often we go off on tangents. In terms of multiple schools competing with each other, I'm fine with that but remember that merit pay will help eliminate any sharing of valuable techniques between corporations. And don't think that private schools would want merit pay based on improvement....they would want it based on achievement since their students typically start with a stronger background. I went to a workshop that had a two-hour pop in session with Tony Bennent, Indiana's secretary of education and he was specifically asked how the proposed structure of merit pay would not eliminate resource sharing amount corporations. He really didn't provide a viable answer to it. The proposed method of measuring teacher 'value' is incredibly archaic and random, which is the biggest issue. Let me ask you a question, Lars, do you have kids in school? If so, ask them how many days of standardized testing they had. If you don't think that the government is turning education into a business, then I think you need to talk with your local administrators. |
| |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 06:27 PM Post #24 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
A good thought, but you have to keep in mind that the state has decided to pretty much stop funding teacher training....so instead of schools putting additional resource money into training, they are simply trying to keep from having to reduce staff. The state budget that just passed is calling for funding that will come nowhere even close to inflation and probably a quarter of all school districts will recieve less funding in 2010-2011 than they recieved in 2009. At the same time the state wishes to increase student achievement, they pull remedial funding. This effects the have-nots much more than the haves. In the classes I teach, currently merit pay is a non-issue as they are not currently on the testing docket and would not be for some time....but I know that the tests in place are currently incredibly flawed and the state refuses to provide so much as a practice test. If you think this is a simply a money thing, you're wrong...I put way too much of my own time, money and resources in the past when merit pay wasn't even being discussed. |
| |
![]() |
|
| HoosierLars | Jul 1 2009, 06:34 PM Post #25 |
![]()
3 in a row
|
I have a kid who will be in 4th grade, and agree that our modern standardized testing is wasteful. I believe that if you were able to compete with other teachers in a free market environment, you would make out better, and the dead weight in administration would need to seek employment elsewhere. If I had the option to shop between 3-4 schools, I would pick the one with real math (not the mambi-pambi discovery horseshit) and focus on the basics. |
| |
![]() |
|
| yawnzzz | Jul 1 2009, 06:38 PM Post #26 |
|
Coach
|
Another thought is that won't this give teachers an incentive to go to worse schools? If teachers at your school have learned your tricks of the trade, then your students will likely come in where they should be, which leaves less room for improvement unless you're able to increase them a grade a head of where they should be. |
![]() |
|
| eelbor | Jul 1 2009, 07:10 PM Post #27 |
![]()
Zen Master
|
Ok, at my job if I were to discover a new method to do my work which would allow me to up my output by say 20% my employer would expect me to train all of co workers in the said technique. I would get a hefty bonus, but starting the next year I would be on level footing again with my peers. Your situation is little different. I can no more claim to be a business within a business anymore than you can. Just because my employer does not want to give me bonus after bonus for the same improvement does not mean the merit system was flawed.. they paid you once to come up with the improvement, and a bonus because it was a really good improvement. Why should they pay you every subsequent year for doing nothing new? |
![]() "Liberal, shmiberal. That should be a new word. Shmiberal: one who is assumed liberal, just because he's a professional whiner in the newspaper. If you'll read the subtext for many of those old strips, you'll find the heart of an old-fashioned Libertarian. And I'd be a Libertarian, if they weren't all a bunch of tax-dodging professional whiners." - Berkeley Breathed Meat is Murder. Sweet, delicious murder. | |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 07:36 PM Post #28 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
Biggest issue is you are calling merit pay a 'bonus,' which it would not be. Money is limited, so basically merit pay is coming from the pool of teacher salaries, not as an extension to regular payroll. Example: System without merit pay: average teacher salary is $40,000 System with merit pay: average teacher salary is $38,000 and average merit pay is $2000 So by your reasoning, merit pay only during the first year doesn't make sense. Secondly, if you think you have to do the same thing year after year to get the same results from a completely different group of kids, you're incorrect. |
| |
![]() |
|
| brumdog44 | Jul 1 2009, 07:48 PM Post #29 |
![]()
The guy picked last in gym class
|
The biggest problem is that same standardized testing you are talking about is exactly what they want merit pay to be based on. It doesn't take a genius to figure out exactly what to do if you want to increase the scores, and certain schools....maybe ones that your child is in....have sold their soul and are doing it. I know of high schools that for the better part of the past decade took every day in the first month of school and worked only toward ISTEP material regardless of what class the student was in. So they didn't cover the standards for the classes they were in -- i.e., when they should have been learning government or biology, they were instead covering algebra and english. The ISTEP GQE sophomore exam became the single measure that everyone went by to measure a school's success. My district did not do this, and our scores were hurt in comparison to others. We had several affluent parents send their students to another public school, citing our ISTEP scores as the reason (we are at the state average, so I don't want to make it seem like we were low). Meanwhile, we were one of only five schools in Porter and Lake County (there are probably 60 to 70 school districts in the counties) that regularaly scored higher than the state average in the number of student both taking and passing AP exams....which should have been the more attractive part to students of high achieving students. Unfortunately, the bill of goods that is being sold paints an inaccurate picture. |
| |
![]() |
|
| eelbor | Jul 1 2009, 07:50 PM Post #30 |
![]()
Zen Master
|
I understand no two classes are the same. That is the danger of over simplification. No two airports that I go into are the same either. Merit pools at my job are an extension of regular salary, but they are limited. They take x% of the base salaries companywide and give out money from that pool. The x% of money in the pool is determined by how much money the company makes. That is the biggest difference. If I were to come up with a revolutionary technique, I could potentially save my company millions or make the company millions. When you are dealing with education it is basically a fixed budget. You will not make the school more money or save the school money. You may dramatically improve the finished product, the children, but how do you propose they put a price on that? You are not allowed to charge the parents more for a well educated child and like half price for a slightly stupid child. Schools are funded by taxes. The other difference is, my job owns all rights to any intellectual property I produce while I am employed by them. Even if it happens while I am at home on vacation. If I write a book in my spare time, they own it. |
![]() "Liberal, shmiberal. That should be a new word. Shmiberal: one who is assumed liberal, just because he's a professional whiner in the newspaper. If you'll read the subtext for many of those old strips, you'll find the heart of an old-fashioned Libertarian. And I'd be a Libertarian, if they weren't all a bunch of tax-dodging professional whiners." - Berkeley Breathed Meat is Murder. Sweet, delicious murder. | |
![]() |
|
| 1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous) | |
| Go to Next Page | |
| « Previous Topic · Politics · Next Topic » |
| Track Topic · E-mail Topic |
7:44 PM Jul 10
|











7:44 PM Jul 10