By Marty Mayfield
KRTN Multi-Media
For the second year in a row the Raton Public Schools have received a grant award to go toward a pay for performance pilot program for teachers.
Last year Raton Schools received $153,000 that was dispersed to teachers based on their yearly evaluation. They 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.
This year the school district received $263,000 to be given to teachers. There are 77 teachers in the school system this year and the money will be dispersed in the same manor as it was last year with $3,000 going to teachers who achieve an effective rating on their annual evaluation, $5,000 for those receiving highly effective and $7,000 going to those with an evaluation rating of exemplary.
Principal Kristie Medina who wrote the grant was pleased that the pilot program is working for the school system. Last year there were several teachers who received a higher evaluation than the district estimated which affected the distribution of the grant money. Medina went on to say this is not a pay increase its a way for the district to honor the hard work that teachers put in, its a way to say thank you for the work they do.
According to Medina they designed the program to be as simple as they could so that teachers knew what they needed to do to earn a bonus. She noted that this program just like the teacher evaluation program is still a political issue but it was a nice incentive that arrived in teacher’s paychecks in June to start the summer off. Evaluations come out in May and teachers can expect to get word on their incentive pay before the June recess.
