Florida

Putting Education Reform To The Test

Topics

Does Performance-Based Pay Have Any Merit?

Background

Florida is a pioneer in the effort to base teacher salaries on student performance and give those teachers with the best results the highest raises, and a bill creating a sweeping new merit pay system was the first legislation Gov. Rick Scott signed into law in March.

Merit pay is a reform pillar of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and the Foundation for Excellence in Education he founded. Bush pushed for the idea while in Florida and is now touting the benefits of performance-based pay nationwide. the idea is to reward teachers who get the best results or most improvement from their students — just as the private sector would pay for performance.

The concept has district-level support too, such as Hillsborough County Public Schools superintendent MaryEllen Elia, herself a former teacher. Elia believes testing students’ knowledge before and after a course will reveal how effective a teacher is.

Data-based analysis of teacher performance is here to stay. Hillsborough County is using a $100 million Gates Foundation grant to design a new system to evaluate and train teachers. Florida won a $700 million federal Race To The Top grant to design a similar statewide evaluation system — which lawmakers now require.

Teachers and their unions object to basing teacher pay on the results of standardized exams designed to test something else entirely, but many teacher unions signed on to the Race to The Top grant.

Latest Posts

What Are Texas’ Seven College Solutions?

The Texas model is doing to higher education what the Florida model did for K-12, at least according to supporters of the seven-point reform plan. Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican, has been passing the plan around to higher education officials and has tentatively signaled his support in interviews. The reforms are a hallmark of Republican […]

Hillsborough Wins Principal Development Grant

Hillsborough County has won another national education grant, this time to improve principal training. The Wallace Foundation announced Hillsborough was one of six districts to share a $75 million, six-year grant. Districts will receive $7.5 million to $12.5 million to develop programs in four areas: rigorous job requirements, high-quality training, selective hiring, and on-the-job evaluation […]

Teachers Believe Income Is Out of Their Hands

First grade teacher Elton Wright feels powerless. He and his wife, also a teacher, are absorbing a 3 percent cut in pay required earlier this year by the Florida Legislature. “People are angry,” said Wright, who teaches at Eagle’s Nest Elementary School in Orange County. “They feel as though this was forced on them. There […]

Five Things To Know About Florida’s New Education Requirements

The new teacher evaluations and merit pay plans school districts are rolling out this year that StateImpact Florida reported yesterday are just a portion of a broad education reform package lawmakers approved last spring. Here’s what to know about the Student Success Act, also known as Senate bill 736:

Merit Pay Could Mean Big Rewards for Florida Teachers

The best Miami-Dade teachers could buy a new car with their bonuses this year while most of their colleagues may only be able to replace an alternator with their bonuses. The difference in the size of those checks is an attempt to pay teachers based on their performance and that of their students, also known […]

Don’t Blame Testing for Atlanta Cheating, Former School Chief Says

Former Atlanta school chief Beverly Hall has a column in Education Week addressing her school district’s cheating on state tests. Her conclusion? Don’t blame the reforms.   “Should I have anticipated cheating, based on dramatic gains in test scores? With hindsight, I wish I had. But there was every reason to believe that our dramatic […]

Gov. Rick Scott: Fund School Reforms With Savings

Gov. Rick Scott has launched an August Charm Offensive, serving doughnuts to voters and attempting to build a relationship with state media. Scott stopped by WUSF radio in Tampa Friday as part of his three-day visit to the city. Scott touched on the economy, the state budget and other issues, but was also asked how […]

Will Florida Cheat Too?

Florida is tempting cheating by basing teacher salaries on the results of the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test, Fred Grimm opines in the Miami Herald today. Lawmakers required school districts create pay-for-performance systems where at least half a teacher’s evaluation is determined by an FCAT score. That sets Florida up for the same type of systematic […]

More Money Off The Table at School Funding Summit

Florida education leaders are meeting in Tampa today to discuss school funding, but do not expect the panel to endorse more money for schools. Roberto Martinez, the state Board of Education member who pushed for the budget discussion, said his goal is to brainstorm ideas that would help schools do more with the resources they […]

Five Ways Teachers Are Changing

The National Center for Education Information released its most recent national teacher survey this morning and it shows some changes among the country’s 3.2 million educators. Teachers are “slightly more satisfied” with their working conditions and community status than they were in 2005, 1996, 1990 and 1986 surveys. About 40 percent of teachers hired since […]

About StateImpact

StateImpact seeks to inform and engage local communities with broadcast and online news focused on how state government decisions affect your lives.
Learn More »

Economy
Education