Bonuses for Teachers
There are pros and cons to this teacher pay proposal:
House Bill 2430, sponsored by Democrat Jason Holsman, would pay teachers a recruitment bonus of $5,000 to work in a small district. Math and science teachers would get $7,500.
After five, 10 and 20 years in the district, the teacher would receive a retention bonus of $2,500, $5,000 and $10,000 respectively.
Rewarding teaching just for sticking around is not the way to encourage innovation. If you’ll get a bonus after a certain number of years automatically, why strive to teach better? Current salary schedules already place too much emphasis on tenure and not enough on teaching quality.
On the other hand, higher pay for math and science teachers is a good idea. Districts have trouble holding on to math and science teachers when they have to pay them the same as English and history teachers. In general, districts should be free to offer more money to teachers they want to retain — whether that’s because they teach hard-to-staff subjects or because they’re exceptional teachers.
