Merit pay is the idea that an educator makes money based off how well his or her students perform in class. Currently, educator’s salaries are based off how much experience and the level of education he or she has. As of now, forty-three states have implemented the common core that is a bunch of standards that are created to assess student performance. Along with the common core, other programs such as benchmarks, the HSPA and NJASK in New Jersey, and the implementation of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) program are also used to assess student performance. The NCLB is a program that shows that every child, not matter what socioeconomic status or any other condition, is able to reach the educational standards for the state he or she lives in …show more content…
This is also a reflection of the educator’s methods of teaching these students and making education a very important for the entire country to help the students reach certain educational goals to help them in their future careers. Student performance does not affect an educator’s salaries that could be a problem because a teacher could care less about how well his or her students are doing in the class and still get paid a good amount of money. The implementation of merit pay would increase student performance because every student learns the material differently through different learning principles, are stronger in certain areas or intelligences and weaker in others, and cognitive development could be different for every child and educators need to take this into account in order for students to be …show more content…
In a classroom setting, operant conditioning, which is a type of learning process that is controlled by the consequences of behavior, or in this case performance, is used to help students improve in their educational career. Observational learning is when someone models another person’s behavior through observation, which can be used to help develop certain skills. Classical conditioning is when two stimuli are repeated over and over again to get an automatic response, and the responses come in series of stimuli and responses (Myers & Dewall, 2015). Classical conditioning can also be seen in the classroom not only as the students’ behavior is shaped that can help students perform better, but also to teach the students their subject material. It is believed that, as a result of merit pay, if these learning principles are applied in the classroom, then student performance would increase based on the way they learn in their classes. This would mean that higher student performance would result in educators getting a better paycheck since he or she is doing his or her job and would be paid accordingly. Also, in Chris Christie’s letter to the federal government for the Race to the Top program said that “a merit-pay system will financially reward highly effective teachers and
Obtaining a good education is probably one of the most sought out dreams in America. Although education is free for all American citizens, there are several obstacles that impact the population from receiving equal education benefits. Two groups that experience a difference when receiving an education are the rich and the poor. Inequality among different social classes in America can make it extremely difficult for the poor to receive the similar education equality as the wealthy. These inequalities can lower the chance of individuals living in poverty stricken communities from receiving a reasonable education. Education can be impacted by location, wealth, and state funding. Each factor plays an important part in the education citizens across America receive.
The case study titled "School Officials from Marshall Metro High School Attempt to Motivate Students & Teachers to Achieve Higher Performance" is about the different ways the school system used to motivate the students to come to school (Kinicki & Williams, 2013, p.405). It is also a good example of how rewards and behavior can affect the outcome of the situation.
Operant conditioning is when your behavior is based on consequences. If Zane has never been praised for playing his oboe well, then he might not be as confident as if he had been complimented. If he has gotten compliments from playing before then he is expected to do better during his evaluation.
This essay will attempt to determine whether access to free education for everyone in the United Kingdom has led to the creation of a meritocratic society. A meritocracy is a social system whereby success depends solely on the skills and efforts of a person rather than their social status or gender. It is an ‘extension of a general system of rewarding merit’. (Sen: 2000: 8). Any person, no matter who they are or where they are from can achieve their goals by working hard. In the education system, the rewards are qualifications, these allow a person to advance to further stages of life and so are essentially a vital form of social mobility. Sen (2000: 1) states that ‘[t]he concept of ‘merit’ is deeply contingent on our views of a good society’.
Some people believe merit pay creates competition and favoritism. They seem to think school systems will pay some teachers more than others and create a “battle” for money. In Merit Pay: Good for Teachers? By Gary Drevitch, one interviewee states, “I know it’s worked in some places, but I shudder at the idea of teachers being in competition with each other.” None of these problems will occur if school districts implement a successful, unbiased system. Another issue society presents when it comes to merit pay comprises of differentiating a “good” teacher from a “bad” teacher. School districts can easily evaluate a teacher’s ability to educate students by the work teachers put into helping students. Student’s reactions to a teacher’s class can also help evaluate teachers. More often than not, students will love a class where the teacher clearly demonstrates lessons, explain procedures, and adds elements of fun. On the other hand, students typically dislike classes where the teacher only comes in for a paycheck. This attitude is displayed by their lackadaisical teaching style. Other people argue that money should not be the reason why people go into teaching. Richard Barbieri, author of Merit Pay? argues that money is not an external motivator, but the substance of a teacher’s motivation. Financial incentives will cause employees to work harder
There is an unequal balance in America's public school funding system. Every state and district requires different amounts of federal funding for their schools. Therefore, living in a poverty stricken community compared to a wealthier community, school funds would look a lot different. Wealthier communities typically have a greater pay for teachers, therefore attracting the best teachers. There would be more plentiful materials to help children learn as well due to funding. Less fortunate communities would be somewhat of the opposite. This inequality in the public school system is unfair to the most vulnerable - children.
Effective teachers are inadequately rewarded in the United States. School districts, such as those in California, are just starting to implement merit pay. According to a study conducted by the National Center of Performance Incentives (NCPI), only about 500 school districts out of the 14,000 districts in the US implement merit pay for teachers. These numbers do not include private schools. Unfortunately, teachers, parents, and students hurt because many schools, private and public, base teacher pay on seniority and degrees rather than achievement and performance. Under such a system, novice teachers, are laid off during budget shortages. Moreover, with the current “single salary schedule” system, teachers are inadequately paid, especially when compared to other professions. Because the single salary schedule creates many issues, a solution needs to be proposed. Merit pay, a system based on performance, solves such issues. With this system, teacher performance outweighs teacher seniority. As a result, quality teachers will be rewarded adequately in terms of money and recognition. Outstanding teachers will no longer face unreasonable layoffs and will finally be paid more than their ineffective peers.
Students should be paid for having good grades. According to Psychology Today, the United States has fallen behind other nations in education. In addition to this, approximately one in four students in the U.S. drops out of school before graduation. The main reason for this is that students have little to no motivation. Students are either bored with school, or they are distracted by the other things that go on in their lives such as sports, jobs, friends and their own family life.
Some locations in the United States are trying to improve their education by adding quality teachers. A major reason why there is an achievement gap in education is because there exist a gap in teachers as well. Research has shown that teacher quality counts. Some states are seeking ways to keep quality teachers and ways to attract them. In New York City, the schools will not hire teachers that are not certified. Also, New York and California are adding some sort of incentive in public schools, to attract quality teaching to minority schools. Sometimes school add annual bonus up to $10,000 for qualify teacher to work in public school, with low achieving schools. Also, many state provide some sort of tuition assistance for teacher, but of all of the states only seven target the candidates to commit to the lower achieving schools (Olsen, 2003).
Develop an argument on or some ideas of understanding about curriculum as multicultural text by relating the works of Darling-Hammond, French, & Garcia-Lopez, Delpit, Duarte & Smith, Greene, Nieto and Sletter to your experience of curriculum, teaching, and learning as affirming diversity. You could think specifically about the following questions: Is there a need for diversity in curriculum studies and designs? Why? What measures do you think will be effective in incorporating such a need into curriculum studies and designs? What is the relevance of diversity to your career goal, to education in your family, community, and school, to education in Georgia, and to education in general? In which way can you develop a curriculum which helps cultivate empathy, compassion, passion, and hope for citizens of the world, and which fosters social justice?
The analytical lens that will be constructed aims to allow for an interpretation of how students who are attempting to be upwardly-mobile are helped with moving beyond roadblocks that prevent mobility. This is mobility is achieved through a combination of adherence to meritocratic systems and the borrowing of cultural capital. I will argue that reproduction occurs when reliance on meritocracy in the educational system and the limited cultural capital of the student’s working-class parent/s are solely employed. In order to move beyond a mere reproduction of the parent’s social class, I argue that the student must interact with individuals or groups from higher social spheres who know how to activate cultural capital in specific instances
In conclusion, students should be paid to do well in school because it has many benefits to the student. Those benefits include motivation to get good grades, the money would help the student financially, and the student would learn how to manage their money more effectively. School is a big part of every person’s life, so it should be more rewarding to the
In many states, teachers are underpaid. Though money is not the motive for most teachers, without enticing salaries, many are lured away from the teaching profession and graduates looking for a first year teaching position are not given much to look forward to. So, since teachers are not paid adequately, raising the pay scale would ensure that our children are left in the hands of quality educators. One way teachers can be sufficiently compensated is by merit pay. The formula is simple; as test scores and evaluations rise, so would the teachers’ salaries. Although controversial, it is just one of many
Classical conditioning and operant conditioning both played a key role in the history of the study of learning, but, as argued by B.F Skinner, there are key differences to be noted between the two (Gleitman, Gross, Reisberg, 2011).
The idea of meritocracy is beneficial to get rid of inequality if it is implemented without the interference of other factors. These factors, I believe, play a greater role in determining the fate and success of an individual. These non-merit factors are inheritance, unequal educational opportunities, luck, discrimination and poverty. Even an individual, who has unparalleled merit in his society, would not be able succeed if he does not have the non-merit factors in favor of him. This, I think, proves that even though meritocracy can be beneficial, due to the interference of other factors, as a whole it is not beneficial.