Teachers pay

When we all look back on our schooling we can always pick out that teacher who was an absolutely horrible, just didn’t care and it reflected in their teaching. This in the end hurts no one but you. If we could eliminate these teachers what would the future be? With more high quality teachers the sky is the limit.

Teachers are the largest single budget items of schools, and in my opinion teachers are the most important determinate of school quality. So then you would want the best teachers for your school. What school does not strive for that? The biggest question is how to get high quality and the best teachers in your school? The simplest answer to that question would be more money. In no way does giving a teacher more money do they teach better, but they may make a better effort to prepare to the best of there abilities, most people would be very appreciative of the increase. It opens up many other doors of opportunities. For instance with now above average salaries you would could a different tier of teachers that you would not have gotten before. The number one reason more students and especially your elite students don’t go into teaching is because you simply don’t make enough money to live the lifestyle you otherwise would with a top notch degree and job.

Another advantage to raising teacher salary is a much lower teacher turnover rate. Now with a sub stainable salary schools will not have to worry about losing their good teachers to other schools because the pay would be set at the state level. Also this would take care of the teacher shortage which is a result of the low pay. With the more money you create a higher job market along with an increasing demand. Schools now have the ability to evaluate, and analysis potential workers. Which would answer the questions of how to eliminate the not up to par teachers. Now just increasing the pay for teachers does not solve the education problem there are still flaws in this idea. Due to the now attractiveness of the teachers union now you will get “money grubbers” people who are strictly in it for money, One possible way to stop this would be to put the teachers a screaming process that would concentrate on the applicants moral’s and character this would give you a better understanding of the individual.

Opposing people have said we can not finically support more teaching funding, how do school systems pay for such an increase? Simple you raise taxes nobody likes to here that but the government makes up reasons to do it, so let’s make it mean something and affect the country future in a positive way.  This would create a better educated population which could do great things and affect our youth in a positive way. It would take an estimated 2 million dollars per state to make this work, but a required sacrifice for the greater good would have to take place. Another idea floating around would be state stimulus funds that the federal government issued to each state strictly for the use of teachers pay.

Mike Antonucci fromCaliforniaUniversitysuggested that system of bonuses for improved test scores would help improve teacher quality. This could be very effective in improving student test scores. While also giving teachers more incentivizes to make a better effort. Could also be a less financial burden on school systems has well.

One question may be how determining the pay for teachers? With the system we have now Public school teachers are paid according to a union-negotiated, one-size-fits-all, seniority-based salary schedule. This means that high-performing teachers are paid the same as mediocre or incompetent teachers. Freeing teachers from seniority-based pay scales would force schools to directly compete with each other to attract and retain good teachers. Administrators would need to provide appropriate financial rewards to teachers who excel or risk losing them to a competing school. Mediocre or incompetent teachers would be forced to improve their skills or choose another line of work. These changes would bring the teaching profession into line with other professional occupations. The way to determine a high performing teacher is simple how the students due on the Standardized test. There may be flaws in basing a salary off of one test but that’s what the State bases on how smart a student or well a school does by, so if students are graded on this test then so can the teachers. .

Very basic idea with several questions still to be answered but I truly believe it is the answer to our education problem teachers are everything when it comes to our youth and who would not like to have the smartest and brightest when it comes to teaching. In some cases simply throwing money at the problem is not the answer but in this case maybe it is.

Work Cited

(How to improve the supply of high-quality teachers/Hanushek A. Eric, Rivkin G. Steven/Brookings Papers on Education Policy © 2004 The Brookings Institution)

(Increasing teachers pay the right way/Brouillette J. Matthew/Mackinac Center for Public Policy 2000 inMidland,Michigan.)

(One yard below: 2/ Antonucci, Mike/ The Education Intelligence Agency conducts public education research, analysis and investigation.