Calculating the Bonus
It is our belief that every child should be able, if given sufficient instruction, to pass the test to earn a Certificate of Initial Mastery, and should be able to pass each of the tests which lead up to the Certificate. This goal dictates how the bonuses would be awarded: using a stepped system, as opposed to a straight percentage. If the percentage of students who passed the skills tests decided the percentage of the bonus the teachers receive, there would possibly be a tendency for teachers to "discard" students, to rationalize that certain students probably won't be able to pass, and so not focus attention on them. The cost to the teacher for discarding a student would be minimal, perhaps resulting in teachers receiving 98% of the possible bonus instead of 100%. A stepped bonus system would insure that teachers focus attention on every student.
The steps would vary, depending on the educational level. We believe that every child should be able to progress through grade school and junior high. Thus to earn 100% of the bonus, 100% of the students in a grade school or junior high school must pass. The next bonus step would be 50% of bonus; if even one student does not pass the skills tests, then the teachers receive only 50% of the possible bonus at the first pay-out. Thus a teacher earning the average salary would have half of her $2,956 bonus delayed; a single failing student would cost him or her $1478. We believe that this will give teachers a reasonably strong incentive to make sure students do not "fall through the cracks". The next threshold would be a 90% passing rate. If less than 90% of the students passed the skills exams, the teachers would receive no bonus at the initial pay-out. The pool of students on which this passing percentage is based is the number of students who are enrolled in the tested class level (3,6 or 8) that year, including those who transfer during the school year. An argument could be made that we should allow exemptions, that some children in a school should not be counted as part of the pool, and thus their performance should not affect teacher's bonuses. Transfers, obviously, are the clearest example; is it fair to judge the performance of teachers using a child who transferred from a district which might have much lower academic standards? This point is valid. However, not including children entails even greater difficulties, both bureaucratically and in terms of the child's education. Essentially, not including transfers in the pool amounts to not holding them to the same educational standards as the rest of the children. At what point would we expect the child to catch up, to meet the standards other children are achieving? Will they be expected to meet standards at the next school, or would they be exempted there as well? This is the danger of exemptions. Not allowing exemptions will be in some cases unfair to teachers, but creating a habit of exemptions would be even more unfair to the students.
Although ideally we would like to see all students compete a Certificate of Advanced Mastery as well as a Certificate of Initial Mastery, this is perhaps asking too much; goals for teachers should be demanding, but not so demanding as to be unrealistic. It is likely that even with the tuition guarantee and educational reforms, some students will still drop out of high school. Thus we propose to set the first bonus step at the high school level at 90%; if 90% of the students at a given high school pass one of the mastery exams, the teachers receive 100% of their bonus. If less than 90% pass, the teachers would receive only one half of their bonus at the first pay-out. The second step would be 80%; if less than 80% of the students pass one of the Mastery Exams, the teachers would receive no portion of their bonus at the first pay-out.
Unlike the lower educational levels, the pool of students upon which the bonus is based would not be the number that entered the twelfth grade at the beginning of the school year, but rather the number of students that entered the class (for example, class of '94 or class of '95) in the ninth grade year, plus or minus any transfers. If the bonus were figured on the number who entered the twelfth grade, then teachers would have an incentive to put pressure on poorly performing students to drop out; essentially, the teachers could attempt to weed out those students they do not think will be able to pass the test, before those students enter the twelfth grade. By basing the bonus on the number of students who actually enter the high school in a given class, this incentive is removed. A student who drops out in the tenth grade and a student who takes but does not pass a Mastery exam have an equivalent effect on teachers' bonuses. We believe this will give teachers an incentive to encourage all students to stay in school.
Next: Second Pay-out