As CPS prepares to close a record number of schools, the fate of students and communities is in question.
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Chicago wins more federal funds for teacher merit pay
By: Rebecca Harris / September 23, 2010
As CPS prepares to pull the plug on its current merit pay program, known as Chicago TAP, the district has received a $34 million federal grant to launch a new merit pay program that would affect over 1,100 teachers at 25 schools.
As CPS prepares to pull the plug on its current merit pay program, known as Chicago TAP, the district has received a $34 million federal grant to launch a new merit pay effort that would affect over 1,100 teachers at 25 schools.
While few specifics about the program are available, it appears to be wider-reaching that TAP. In addition to paying teachers based on observation ratings and student performance, which TAP did, the new program will offer extra money for teachers who work in hard-to-staff schools and subject areas. It will also “focus on using evaluation ratings in promotion, tenure, dismissal, and career growth roles,” according to the grant’s abstract. In addition to value-added ISAT data (which has been TAP’s mainstay), the new program will factor in scores on the Scantron interim assessments that students take several times a year.
Chicago Public Schools will also chip in $6 million over the life of the grant, and the Chicago Public Education Fund will back the program with an additional $700,000. As with TAP, at least three-quarters of teachers at a given school will have to approve participation in the new program, says Janet Knupp, founding president and CEO of the Chicago Public Education Fund.
The announcement comes in the wake of two recent blows to the concept of merit pay as a way to improve education. Earlier this week, a major study conducted by the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University found that merit pay does not affect student achievement. And this spring, a study of Chicago TAP found that it had no effects on student achievement or teacher turnover.
TAP’s supporters, however, noted that the study covered just a year and a half of the program and did not account for differences in implementation.
Even so, “the elements of TAP were exactly right on,” Knupp says. And many of those elements – like special career roles for master teachers, professional development that master teachers deliver through team meetings and coaching, and more frequent teacher observations – will be carried over. (According to the grant’s abstract, the program includes “a comprehensive professional development plan that differentiates training according to participants' roles and responsibilities.”)
But some TAP schools suffered from an inability to faithfully implement the program – perhaps leading to the study results, which showed that the program did not have any effects on teacher turnover or student achievement.
“Testing for principal capacity was something we paid much more attention to with this grant proposal,” says Kathleen St. Louis, director of program investments for the fund. “Based on [Chief Area Officer] assessments, we looked at the professional capacity of the principals that are leading these schools so we have a better indicator of where we will be able to implement with fidelity.”
The new program will likely be more expensive than TAP, which used just $27.5 million in federal money to fund a merit pay program at 40 schools. “We’re trying to do a lot more with this,” says Jason Cascarino, director of strategy and operations at Chicago Public Education Fund. “We want to learn from this and... [figure out] how to scale this up to a district level.”
It isn’t clear yet how much money teachers or principals could be eligible for – or how much of their pay would be determined by each factor. But principal evaluations and pay will be based at least partly on the same “success factors” that Chicago Public Schools now uses to screen its principal candidates.
It also hasn’t been determined whether the student achievement component will be based on schoolwide, grade-level, or classroom-level test scores – or some combination. (The district tried to use classroom-level test score data with TAP, but has run into technical problems in matching teachers and students.)
Knupp says that many of the program’s details will be determined in conjunction with the Chicago Teachers Union and input from other stakeholders. “We of course have a union administration to work with,” she says.
Chicago Teachers Union spokeswoman Liz Brown says that the union is in favor of the career ladder model the grant uses, where more experienced teachers can earn increased responsibilities and pay.
But CTU isn't open to the idea of using teacher evaluation data for tenure and dismissal decisions – or giving merit pay based on individual teachers' test scores. (Using grade-level or schoolwide test scores is something that “we'd have to talk about,” Brown says.)
What's more, she says, parents and students should be included in the process of helping design any new merit pay program.
“The very first thing is that the union and educators have to sit down [with the district] and define teacher quality before we learn how to measure it,” Brown says. “This grant is over a 5-year period, but that would be the first step.”
Chicago wins more federal funds for teacher merit pay
I worked for two years for a wonderful principal. She stated to us every year on our first day back: "Happy teachers make happy students." Then she practiced this. Our school for the first time, made AYP in one year! I just found out today that CPS let he go and she is now unemployed.
There is no considderation of merit in this system.
Chicago wins more federal funds for teacher merit pay
In response to 'Carrot and stick': Can you get in touch with us here at Catalyst? I am wondering what school you are referring to... if you would like to tell us off the record, that is fine. My email is rharris@catalyst-chicago.org, phone is 312-673-3874. If we can find people to tell us more about this, the kinds of occurrences you are describing would be very relevant for us to include in future Catalyst coverage on this topic...
Chicago wins more federal funds for teacher merit pay
As a teacher who is presently at a school that has enforced teacher evaluations tied to salary, I feel comfortable stating that this is a terrific idea in theory and a terrible idea in practice.
My colleagues are falling apart at the seams due to the evaluations. There are 4 ways to be evaluated: terrible, mediocre, good, and amazing. The school isn't satisfied with "good" ratings. They use the carrot and stick approach. No matter how hard we try or how well we do, we are pushed to do things faster, better, whatever. It is breaking the teachers apart to the point where teachers have broken down in tears or walked out of the building. If you aren't amazing, your salary basically freezes and you are dead in the water. It was explicitly stated that if you DON'T advance to the amazing category, this school is not for you. In other words, you are canned. We are using the Charlotte Danielson framework, in case anyone cares. If you don't hit distinguished, you're out on your butt.
I don't know a single person at my school who DOESN'T want to be an amazing teacher. But becoming an amazing teacher is a long process, not overnight success. The school doesn't care and we keep getting pushed for perfection.
If I could leave right now, I would never come back. I can not handle the emotional stress and breakdowns over a stupid evaluation. I am a good teacher, I am proud to be a good teacher. I am not going to let this school break me down and make me hate myself because I am not perfect. When January rolls around, I am going to start kissing butt and applying at other schools where I will be a valued staff member.
The thing that really gets to me is that no where are the children ever asked what THEY think about their teachers. The students aren't stupid, they know if they were supported, encouraged, and cared for. They can tell you if the teacher makes sense or if the teacher is patient and willing to help. We completely ignore their experience in the classroom with that teacher and pretend like 3 evaluations from an outsider is what it takes to determine a teacher's worth. It's malarkey.
Chicago wins more federal funds for teacher merit pay
It isn’t clear yet how much money teachers or principals could be eligible for – or how much of their pay would be determined by each factor. But principal evaluations and pay will be based at least partly on the same “success factors†that Chicago Public Schools now uses to screen its principal candidates.
Chicago wins more federal funds for teacher merit pay
I thnk a far eaiser way to improve school performance would be to use the "$6 million over the life of the grant" CPS will chip in to help stop or reduce the what are effectively pay cuts that principals are experiencing.
Rebecca Harris did a good job summarizing the research on the ineffectiveness of merit pay on student performance. The response of Janet Knupp, founding president and CEO of the Chicago Public Education Fund to these research findings is simply shocking. Arguing that the schools in the study suffered from an inability to faithfully implement the program hence the poor results is basically arguing in a circle, without looking at why these schools could not implement the program or even showing evidence that were it is was supposedly implemented properly that student performance improved.
What we have here is market ideology pure and simple. The concept of the bonus equating to increase worker productivity in the private sector has been studied. As early as 1952 Donald Roy studied this issue and concluded that incentive schemes based on direct work measurement can actually reduce productivity. It also leads to worker burn out if the bonus becomes a larger part of overall expected income.
In machine-tool companies, such as Cincinnati Milacron, Leblond Makino, MSC Industrial, Nardini North Amer-ica, Kearney and Trecker, Summit Machine Tool, Heidenhain, Giddings and Lewis, Hitachi Seiki, Jessen, Watry Industries, and Mazak, profit sharing is popular with executives. However, according to company reports, plant employees regard profit sharing as a reward at the year's end for company performance rather than as a daily motivator for plant production. Other studies indicate that many of the factors used to calculate profits (e.g., material costs, inventory evaluation, pricing, and transportation costs) are beyond the control and efforts of the plant employees, who have little first-hand knowledge of these factors within the realm of their jobs at the plant.
There is a large discussion in management research on how workers game incentive schemes by putting focus on the areas measured related to the incentives and avoiding areas not measured effectively. This too can lead to a reduction in over all productivity. The level of understanding of worker motivation research on the part of CPS is simply put sad, especially for a district that tosses around the term "performance management."
Overall worker job satisfaction shows the best correlation to productivity increases. But higher job satisfaction can also be linked to complacency, depending on the external and internal motivating factors at work on employees involved. Given the very poor working conditions that many teachers face in many low income schools I am having a very hard time seeing how the proposed new merit pay effort will do any better than what has already failed.
Rod Estvan
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