I just heaved a big sigh reading Jay Mathews headline today: "Merit Pay Could Ruin Teacher Teamwork." As a former evaluator of a Teacher Incentive Fund state program, I spent quite a bit of time researching PBPs, including how these programs affect educators in urban school districts. One of the biggest problems, as I see it, is not that these programs "ruin teacher teamwork," but that their payout structure cannot be accurately and succinctly explained to teachers and administrators. And if you don't do that well, confusion breeds mistrust, and the take-away message is typically Mathew's headline....Read it here.
