New York City teachers union (the UFT) agrees to huge merit pay program
February 21, 2003. New York’s United Federation of Teachers (UFT) president Randi Weingarten (above at podium) was invited to be the featured speaker at the convention of the Illinois Federation of Teachers (IFT), the state’s affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers. At the time in 2003, AFT leaders were united in their criticisms of “merit pay” schemes based on controversial and biased standardized tests. Four years later, both Weingarten and Marilyn Stewart, now president of the Chicago Teachers Union, not only agreed to merit pay plans for two of the three largest K-12 locals in the country, but are praising the idea. Seated beside Weingarten in 2003 were Jim Dougherty (center), IFT President, and Deborah Lynch (then CTU President). Substance Archive photo by George N. Schmidt.In an agreement that will have repercussions nationally, the nation’s largest teacher union local recently agreed to a huge merit pay program. On October 17, 2007, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and United Federation of Teachers (UFT) President Randi Weingarten announced an agreement to award cash bonuses to teachers at “high-needs schools that raise student achievement”. During the current school year this will be implemented in 200 schools — 15 percent of New York City’s schools — and the program will expand to nearly 400 NYC schools — 30 percent of the total — in 2008-09.
Fifty-five percent of the union members in a school must vote to accept the plan. Once a school accepts the plan, if their school makes the testing benchmarks (to be determined by the city’s Dept. of Education), the school will be allotted an amount equivalent to $3,000 per union member.
What’s the Problem with Merit Pay?
Test scores are the primary determinant of the “success” of a school; consequently, the emphasis on preparing students for tests will accelerate. When a school’s staff knows that the size of their paychecks depends on their students’ test scores, you better believe they are going to teach the test-based curriculum. UFT union activists say that some of the “high-needs” schools targeted in this plan will be threatened with closing if they do not vote to accept the merit pay plan. Opposition to the merit pay program also is based on the inherent divisiveness of the local school “compensation committee”, comprised by two administrators and two UFT members, who will decide how to distribute the money within the school. Imagine the discussions in your building over who is and who is not carrying their weight within the school. How much should a school clerk be compensated? As much as, or less than a teacher? If less, how much less? How much should teacher assistants be compensated relative to teachers?
What about itinerant staff?
In addition, particularly in the high schools, merit pay will lead to an increase in competition among teachers to teach upper level classes such as honors, IB and AP.
This plan to push low-scoring schools to raise test scores coincides with a recent agreement with the NYC organization representing principals and administrators (the Council of School Supervisors and Administrators) to reward principals who boost test scores in their buildings. This, of course will lead to principals putting even more pressure on teachers to ‘teach to the test’.
Pension Promise to NYC Teachers
New York’s merit pay program was announced at the same press conference at which Mayor Bloomberg publicly agreed to lobby with the UFT in the state legislature for a “25/55” pension law — to allow current members to retire with full pension at age 55 with 25 years service. Currently, most members can retire at 55 only with 30 years of service. However, part of the deal, only if the legislature and governor go along with it, will be that members’ contribution to the pension fund will be permanently raised by 1.85 percent, and new hires will only get to retire at 55 with 27 years of service.
Merit Pay has already come to Chicago
Chicago Public Schools has its own merit pay pilot program which has been in the planning stages for more than a year and was reported in the October Substance. In November, 2006, Arne Duncan, CEO of CPS, announced that a $28 million grant had been awarded to Chicago to fund this program. At the time, the CTU publicly expressed its skepticism about paying teachers for higher test scores.
But, behind closed doors the CTU made an agreement to begin a pilot merit pay program in Chicago called REAL (Recognizing Excellence in Academic Leadership). CTU President Marilyn Stewart, not wanting to jeopardize her re-election bid, did not announce the CTU approval of this program until May 22, 2007, four days after CTU members voted for union president. Currently, ten CPS Schools participate in this program and the program is to be expanded to 40 schools in the coming four years.
Chicago is the first Illinois district to agree to merit pay. In Chicago’s REAL program, yearly performance bonuses (based on test scores) will range from $1,000 to $8,000. Seventy-five percent of the staff must agree to join the plan. Lead teachers at the schools will earn $15,000 more; mentor teachers will get $7000 yearly. [See the October 2007 Substance for a description of REAL].
National Implications
The significance of the largest and third largest US teacher union locals agreeing to merit pay plans can not be overemphasized. Both New York City’s and Chicago’s union leaderships say that the merit pay programs they have agreed to will reward entire school staffs, rather than individual teachers. While school-based merit pay is arguably less damaging than rewarding individual teachers, these agreements are a ‘foot in the door’ for those who seek to further weaken teachers’ unions by the time-honored divide and conquer method. Moreover, these agreements accept the primacy of standardized test scores to measure student learning. And they will lead to the expansion of pay-for-higher-test-scores schemes around the country.
