That's the title of an article in today's Dallas Morning News. LINK
More than two dozen Texas schools have rejected state grants to set up a merit pay program for their teachers, deciding it was unfair to pit teacher against teacher in dividing up thousands of dollars in bonus money.
Although the vast majority of the 1,161 schools that were awarded grants are expected to take the money and run with merit plans this year, teacher resistance to the idea has remained strong. Critics predict that the nation's biggest incentive pay program will not produce the academic gains that proponents suggest.
Gov. Rick Perry and legislative sponsors, on the other hand, contend the concept will work just as it has worked in business.
"It's time to start treating teachers as individual professionals and not as just a monolithic profession. When you reward excellence the same as mediocrity, all too often mediocrity becomes the standard," said Mr. Perry, who has been promoting the program at news conferences in schools across the state.
But his sales job has not worked at schools like Bellaire Elementary School in Hurst or Highland Park Elementary School in San Antonio, where teachers voted to send $90,000 in grants back to the state.
Bea Cantu, principal at Bellaire, said that just two of 47 teachers at the school voted in favor of a plan that was developed to distribute the bonus money. The law creating the program – passed in a special legislative session in May – calls for merit-pay plans in low-income areas, with bonuses to be distributed based on standardized-test scores.
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