Special to KRTN Multi-Media
The results of the state’s first venture into teacher pay for performance offer up what could be a
valuable lesson in quantity vs. quality when it comes to where the dollars should go. And the New Mexico Public Education Department is paying attention.
Of the six districts and 13 charters that chose to participate in the $7.1 million pilot program (Albuquerque Public Schools did not), one offered its employees 78 ways to get merit pay.
Another offered just three.
There’s a four-page spreadsheet of Santa Fe Public Schools’ individual and group options, with most of the measures incremental ones, such as being rated “effective” in the first classroom observation and having increased student attendance on the 40th day of classes. Almost 79 percent of the district’s 1,138 teachers – 896 – got bonus checks. The average payout was $3,407; the total district award was $4.73 million.
In contrast, Raton Public Schools offered merit pay only to individuals who received overall “effective,” “highly effective” or “exemplary” ratings on their annual evaluations. Yet it handed out bonuses to almost as many of its classroom leaders – 61 of 83 teachers, or 73.5 percent. The average payout was $2,330; the total district award was $153,000.
And while PED approved both pay-for-performance plans – maintaining each of the options was tied back to student performance – it now believes the narrower, individual-focused metrics like those used in Raton are more likely to deliver student improvement.
“It was a pilot year,” PED Secretary Hanna Skandera says, and now that the data are in, her take-away is that a tighter focus on individual measures is the best way to reward those educators who really move students forward.
Santa Fe Public Schools did not return a call seeking comment for this column, but Superintendent Joel Boyd has called the merit pay checks “a much-needed pay increase for our hardworking school-based employees.”
However, the program was not designed to be a “pay increase.” Considering Raton and Santa Fe have similar proficiency levels – 44.2 percent (Raton) vs. 47.6 percent (Santa Fe) in reading and 36.3 percent vs. 36.1 percent in math, respectively – it will be interesting to see which approach to merit pay ultimately pays off in greater student improvement.
In Raton’s proposal, the district says that “we know without a doubt that the single greatest factor in student achievement lies in the effectiveness of our teachers and leaders,” that “many of our teachers are working hard (but) need an incentive to work smarter, not harder” and “typically teachers are motivated, in part, by compensation. … Our hope as well is that rewarding highly effective and exemplary teachers will result in them remaining in the teaching profession longer.”
Skandera says those are the two bottom lines to the merit pay program: “award our best and brightest, and retain them.”
And at least in Raton, the teachers are on board. Susan Siefertson, who has taught general, special and gifted elementary education classes in the past 14 years, says “it’s a tough job” and “we all work hard.” The merit pay “became a fun little carrot to remind us all that hard work is appreciated.”
She says she was “very surprised and very grateful” to get monetary recognition for being rated “highly effective,” and while there are concerns in the teaching ranks about the different factors that go into evaluations, “everyone was excited to have the opportunity to receive incentive pay.”
Raton High School principal Kristie Medina, who wrote the district’s application for the performance-pay program, says her bottom lines were to include all classes of teachers and principals, make the process simple and understandable, and ensure the award amounts were “substantial enough to continue to motivate” recipients. (Raton set its top award, for “exemplary” teachers, at $5,181.64; the top individual award in the pilot statewide was $10,000, given to several “highly effective” teachers and the principal at North Valley Academy in Albuquerque.
Raton Superintendent Neil Terhune adds that “teachers are happiest when they see kids learning,” and “the goal (of incentive pay) is to improve student performance. (This system) improves fidelity to the NMTEACH system, and if NMTEACH delivers, (it should) result in higher student achievement as well as “maintain a cohesive, collective group of teachers … who want to stay here and be part of” a successful and rewarding educational system.
Raton’s application ended with the district saying, “Extra money is not a ‘silver bullet’ and we will ensure that the incentive pay model is supported by professional growth for teachers, mentoring, and support and solid feedback through the NMTEACH system to help them improve their craft.” Terhune, Medina and Siefertson say the district has followed through on that promise, setting up mentoring and weekly professional learning communities to brainstorm through everything from curriculum to institutional strategies, all with a focus on student achievement.
Raton and 26 other districts and charters have submitted applications for the second round of pay for performance, and Skandera says demand once again exceeds allocated resources – PED has more than $15 million in proposals and just $9.2 million to award. APS has not applied this time, either.
As staff evaluate those applications, it is clear one school district in northern New Mexico has already taught officials a thing or two about how to target merit pay.
UpFront is a daily front-page news and opinion column. Comment directly to assistant editorial page editor D’Val Westphal at 823-3858 or road@abqjournal.com. Go to ABQjournal.com/letters/new to submit a letter to the editor.
I find it interesting that while the incentive pay can provide motivation for teachers, it’s not without flaws. I personally was not in favor of this grant because I knew that the NMTeach system (teacher’s evaluation system) was flawed and still having the kinks worked out.
I know of teachers who received high incentive pay without any data reported on their evaluations. Of course NMPED says the districts need to clean up all data prior to, but in the end teachers were rewarded unfairly. I reported this to the Raton School’s superintendent and the finance officer numerous times before my departure. The superintendent’s response was that unless a teacher actually asks for a review
of their evaluation then his office would not look at it. My question at that time was, why would a teacher who is slated to have a $5000 bonus want you to review their evaluation?
The evaluation system that those teachers were rewarded on included only observations by the principal (which was me) and teacher attendance. No student achievement data was reported. I believed that my observations were conducted fairly, but how can this be fair to other teachers who did not receive incentive pay because their student data?
I received incentive pay, but received it BEFORE I had received my final evaluation from the superintendent. Is this fair?
Sure the carrot dangling is a wonderful thing. Receiving accolades, appreciation and better yet money will always make a teacher smile. But the teachers I know went into education knowing what was expected and what salaries they could make. They became teachers because they love learning.
Until Raton can clean up their own data, and the NMPED can fully say that their data on student performance is accurate, I find the incentive pay initiative insulting and in the end will pit teachers against each other, rather than build cohesive teams.
Ms. Westphal needs to do a little more research. Incentive pay is not what it seems. It’s destructive, and just plan unfair.