For my take on why equitable grading policies are illogical and misguided, see my previous post about San Francisco’s recent bid to introduce a sweeping Grading for Equity policy. It ultimately failed under intense public pressure once families understood what was happening, because most people do not support these ideas.

It turns out most teachers don’t support them either. That’s the main conclusion from a new report by David Griffith and Adam Tyner at the Fordham Institute. The report draws on a nationally representative survey of teachers to examine their views. Key findings include:

• Equitable grading practices are widespread: About half of teachers say their school or district has adopted at least one “equitable” grading practice, and a third report multiple such policies.
• Most teachers believe these practices are harmful to academic engagement.
• Most teachers want high standards for students but feel pressured to inflate grades.

I encourage interested readers to take a look at the full report. Among other things, it’s a good reminder that teachers aren’t so different from everyone else, and they’re also frustrated by policies that lower expectations.

(Note: In a previous post about the San Francisco policy, I indicated that I hadn’t heard of any “Grading for Equity” policies in Missouri, but a reader reached out to explain that many Missouri districts have adopted them. It is hard to know how many, but their widespread use nationally—as documented in the Fordham report—suggests it could be a lot.)

The post Most Teachers Don’t Like Equitable Grading Practices Either appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

This [policy] does not incentivize (teachers) to try and find a new school or situation that is a better fit for them when they can basically lose their livelihood because months after signing a contract, they realize maybe they need to make a different decision to work in a different setting.

That point sounds vaguely familiar.

Jones is arguing that teachers should be able to break their teaching contract in order to find a school “that is a better fit for them.” Show-Me Institute analysts have been arguing for years that students should be able to find a school “that is a better fit for them” via school choice programs.

I understand the union’s goal is to protect teachers’ rights, but this is an interesting stance to take. In Jones’s view, teachers—grown adults who have made a contractual agreement to teach students for a school year—should be allowed to break their contract and leave their school and students in a lurch. Meanwhile, the MNEA thinks that students who want better educational opportunities should be forced to stay in the schools they are assigned to for up to 12 years.

Teachers should seek to find the best situation for them. Teachers who are not satisfied with their job will not be as effective. However, the Hazelwood teacher had obligations to meet, children to teach, and a contract to fulfill. Breaching your contract and leaving your students and school in the lurch is not an appropriate response to being unhappy with the school.

Teachers are adults who can apply to teach at any school they choose. The vast majority of Missouri children are forced to attend their neighborhood public school with no alternative choices at all. Groups like the MNEA that want as much flexibility as possible for teachers but oppose any flexibility at all for students ought to reflect on the incoherence of that position.

The post Missouri’s Teachers Union Makes School Choice Stance? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

In: letting parents find an education setting that works for their families

Out: giving every student just one assigned option

 So many reasons have popped up for this one in the last year or two. Parents want their children and everyone around them masked. Parents don’t want their children to have to wear a mask all day. Parents want everyone vaccinated. Parents want vaccination to be a personal choice. Parents like, or don’t care, about their school’s curriculum. Parents care a lot about their school’s curriculum. Regardless, the single, assigned option is “out” and letting every family avail themselves of at least one alternative is “in.”

In: school board meetings that include parents and the community

Out: school board meetings with no one but the board in attendance

People have discovered an interesting fact in the past year—school boards actually impact what happens in school buildings, including selecting curricula. Who knew? School boards create textbook selection committees. They hear from textbook publishers. They weigh the options and approve curricula. A broader understanding of their role will (hopefully) make broader participation in their decisions “in” and forgetting they exist “out.”

In: innovative new learning environments

Out: every student learning in a room with a teacher at the front and 20 other students

 When schools shut down, parents didn’t just go along with that program. They joined with other families and created micro-schools in someone’s basement. They sent their children to karate academies or churches for guided virtual learning. They decided to join the homeschool movement. They founded Boys and Girls Clubs, or some other nonprofit, that morphed into an outright school. Necessity is the mother of invention, and public education became inventive. The 1950s education model got tossed “out” in favor of bringing “in” new models of learning.

In: giving teachers autonomy and flexibility

Out: step-and-ladder pay scales

School shutdowns also affected teachers. Some teachers didn’t like teaching virtually; others loved it. Some teachers discovered that teaching just ten students in a micro-school means applying skills more directly, and no staff meetings or red tape. There is a massive opportunity for good teachers to take on gig work as tutors. Joining a school district at the age of 23 and staying in the same district until the age of 55 to be “taken care of” with a pension until death is so “out,” and teachers as entrepreneurs who can be paid directly to teach is “in.”

This list could go on. The bad news is that we are in the middle of a tough road back to recovering learning loss for so many students. The great news is that we’ve been forced change some of the old ways of doing things in favor of parent empowerment and engagement, systemwide flexibility and autonomy, and the notion that one size definitely does not fit all.

The post Year-end In-and-out list appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

What is surprising is how pervasive this apparently is. EdChoice has been polling parents since the shutdown last spring, and its latest poll results indicate that a shocking 35 percent of parents now report that their children are in pandemic pods, and another 18 percent are looking for one. Over half of parents, according to this survey, are writing (or trying to write) their own playbook for how and where their children will be educated. This represents a major disruption that is not going to just go away when schools reopen.

Equally surprising, nearly 70 percent of teachers surveyed expressed at least some interest in teaching in a pandemic pod. Teacher frustration seems to be high. They are dealing with mixed signals and many have to swap between teaching in person, recording virtual lessons, and virtual instruction in real time. The thought of just teaching eight or ten students in a home with no district bureaucracy must be tempting.

We are all exhausted by COVID and ready for things to go back to normal. But normal now is everyone wearing masks, touch-free bathrooms, and no hugging. Some of that will go away and some of it will stay. The same is true for public education. Families and teachers are taking ownership of public education like never before. To have some of that stick would be a much-needed step in the right direction.

The post Parents Are Taking Control of Education appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Regardless of where you stand on the issue of schools reopening, there are some fundamental facts here. First, putting kids together with 20 plus students in a classroom and crowded hallways undoubtedly increases the risk of spread. We can debate how much kids transmit the virus or how few deaths occur among children below the age of 18. These are all important conversations to have. Nevertheless, we cannot deny that schools packed with children are a petri dish where germs (and viruses) are spread. Kids will be kids. They will not effectively social distance and they will not wear their masks with fidelity. Without question, teachers in schools would have a much higher risk of catching COVID than teachers working from their living room.

The second unmistakable fact is that not opening schools will lead to large disruptions in the workforce. Parents without other options will be forced to quit their jobs or work from home as they help their children navigate the new online educational environment. This disruption will lead to decreased productivity and could have long-term negative impacts on the economy. Again, there are other issues we could debate, but there is no denying that closing schools will impact the livelihoods of many families.

We ask essential workers to face greater risks because the products of their labor—their service to us or the goods they produce—are integral to the lives of other people. We do not deny that they increase their risk by going to work. We do not deny that sending essential workers home would impact the lives of others.

It does feel strange that the clearest voices arguing that teachers are not essential are the teachers themselves, while the most persuasive essay arguing they are essential that I have read comes from a nurse.

So, I return to the central question—are teachers essential? I’ll let you, dear reader, determine the answer to this question yourself.

The post Are Teachers Essential or Not? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

You can view the booklet here, or download the .pdf at the link below.

The post Condition of Education in Missouri: 2019 appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

We are in danger as a society of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. We tell everyone that teaching is a thankless, underpaid job and then we wonder why we see declining rates of people going into teaching. 

It is time for us to engage in a little positivity. Teaching is a great profession.

Take for evidence the results of a recent working paper by Alberto Jacinto and Seth Gershenson. Using survey data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY) and the attached Child and Young Adults Supplement (CYA), they examine whether children pursue a career in the same field as their mothers. Their data include jobs of 4,572 children and 2,488 mothers.

Interestingly, they find that children of teachers are significantly more likely to go into teaching than children of nonteachers. They write, “19% of the children of teachers go on to become teachers, compared to only 8% of the children of nonteachers.” While they see some similar trends in other comparable jobs, such as nursing, the relationship between mothers and their children’s jobs is not as strong anywhere as it is in teaching. As Jacinto and Gershenson note, “there is something unique about teaching, as there is relatively strong inter-generational transmission of the profession, even when compared to “similar” professions.”

Jacinto and Gershenson don’t have an explanation for why this is so. They wonder, “Does the transmission of teaching occur because of parental pressure, network membership, information and choice set, or a combination of factors?”

I have a hypothesis: teaching is a great job and the kids of teachers know it!

Sure, there are challenges; it’s work and all work has its thorns and thistles. Nevertheless, teaching as a profession has many redeeming qualities.

Teaching is a job with purpose. As Justin Tarte, the executive director of human resources in the Union R-XI School District wrote on Twitter: “What most adults will never experience in their jobs: A student visiting them years later to say thanks for being there when nobody else was. A parent writing an email saying you changed their child’s life & they can’t thank you enough. That’s why being a teacher is awesome.”  

Teaching provides a stable middle class income. People think teachers make much less than they actually do, typically underestimating the average amount by nearly $19,000. Plus, benefits for teachers are nearly twice as generous as they are for workers in the private sector.

Teaching provides a family-friendly schedule. There are few other jobs where you get winter break, spring break, summers off, plus an additional allotment of “sick” or “personal” days throughout the year.

I could go on, but I think you are getting the point—teaching is a great profession. It’s time we said so.

The post Despite What You’ve Heard, Teaching Is a Great Profession appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Missouri’s largest teacher pension fund, the Public School Retirement System (PSRS), has already begun to recognize the improved mortality rates of teachers. A PSRS report on contribution rates for 2017-2018 notes that the system has already begun updating the plan’s mortality assumptions:

People are living longer. Mortality is improving, not just in Missouri, but also across the nation. As a result, actuaries are utilizing updated mortality tables, which reflect this trend. PSRS/PEERS conducted Actuarial Experience Studies to compare our actuarial assumptions to the actual experience of the Systems. In other words, are members living as long as we assumed they would, or are they actually living longer?

According to the internal PSRS analysis, people are living longer than the plan had assumed. Adjusting for greater longevity led to a tremendous increase in the plan’s liabilities. According to PSRS board chairman Aaron Zalis, “the revised mortality assumptions better reflect PSRS/PEERS’ actual experience, which results in an increase of over $2.1 billion in liabilities to the Systems.”

Teachers in PSRS are eligible to retire with full benefits after 30 years of service, and there are also early retirement options. This means a teacher may retire by 55 with 30 years of service. Given the new mortality tables from the SOA, a large subset of teachers might be expected to live beyond 90 years old, drawing a pension for 35 years or more.

It is unclear if the SOA’s updated mortality tables for teachers will encourage PSRS or Missouri’s other two pension plans to once again change their assumptions. If they do, we can assume the financial health of the plans will decline.

Let’s process what that means for a second. Some teachers in the past did not put enough into the retirement system to cover their own benefits. As a result, the pension plan will become increasingly underfunded. To make up for this, the plan will have to increase contributions for new members, hold down retirement benefits for retirees, or seek higher returns on investments (Read: “risky investments”). None of this is good for teachers of today or tomorrow.

So teachers, keep this in mind when you sign that contract. You are agreeing to fund the benefits of those who went before you. You may be striking a bargain that you end up regretting.

The post Teachers Live Forever appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Pulling from the influencers’ responses, the Star concluded that Missouri needs to pay teachers more. That’s all fine and dandy, but simply paying teachers more is not the solution. As the editorial board points out, schools need to do a better job of paying the best teachers more. The board writes: “Deciding which teachers are “best” is complicated, of course. Test scores? Graduation rates? Classroom grades? Peer reviews? Yet the broad concept of rewarding quality teachers is sound.” I couldn’t agree more, and here’s why.

Most school districts pay teachers on a single salary schedule. This means if you are a rock-star physics teacher with dozens of other lucrative job prospects, you will be paid the same amount as a less-motivated and less-capable teacher who couldn’t find another job if he tried. This pay system is attractive to low-skilled workers, but pushes individuals with a lot of potential into other fields.

This was effectively illustrated by economist Kirabo Jackson on Twitter. I have recreated his graph (which he posted on May 31) below. The solid red line represents the single salary schedule. The blue line represents the ability of a teacher to earn more outside of teaching. As you can see, individuals with low ability (those to the left of point A) are likely to find a teaching career attractive. Meanwhile, higher-ability individuals have an incentive (better pay) to pursue another job. Now look what happens when we simply raise teacher pay (red dotted line). We shift the number of those who would like teaching from point A to point B—a marginal improvement at best.

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Now consider what would happen if we had a pay system that actually paid teachers based on their ability. This is represented by the green line. While the current system is designed to attract the lowest-skilled individuals into the profession, changing the pay structure to reward high performing individuals could make teaching desirable for the best and the brightest.

The Kansas City Star’s editorial board is right: We should pay great teachers more. And we should do it by changing how we pay teachers.

The post Want More Great Teachers? Then Pay Great Teachers More appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

As we watch teacher strikes throughout the country, that’s the same question we should be asking public school administrators.

For decades, our nation has seen substantial increases in education funding. In Missouri, per-student spending in inflation-adjusted dollars increased 33 percent from 1992 to 2014. Yet during that time, average teacher salaries decreased by 4 percent. How is that possible?

What did you spend your money on?

When we look at the numbers, the answer is obvious—people and pensions.

As economist Benjamin Scafidi has shown, the growth in the number of teachers and staff has far surpassed the growth in students. From 1992 to 2015, Missouri saw a 9% increase in students. Meanwhile, schools bulked up by increasing the teaching workforce by 28% and all other staff, including school principals and central office workers, by 24%. When given the money, schools chose to spend it on decreasing the pupil teacher ratio from 16.0 to 13.6. They chose to spend it on aides, principals, secretaries, you name it. They chose not to spend it on pay raises.

But that’s not the only thing keeping teacher salaries down. School administrators also chose (or were forced to choose) to shift compensation into retirement and benefits. This was a shift of about 6 percent of current operating expenditures that went from salary to benefits (see the figure below for a breakdown of Missouri expenditure numbers from 1998 to 2014). Make no mistake: This wasn’t done in order to make teacher benefits better. It was done to help pay for the promises they’d already made.

We all want great teachers, and many of us believe we should increase teacher pay. In fact, 61percent of respondents in the 2017 Education Next poll said we should increase or greatly increase teacher pay. Yet when we increase funding for public schools, the money just doesn’t make it into teachers’ paychecks. Something has to give.

Given the budgetary pressures faced in most states, marching to the statehouse is not an effective strategy. Even if they succeed in getting more funding for public education, there is a good chance that it will not result in substantial pay raises for teachers. At least that’s what history has shown us.

Instead, teachers should be marching to their central office; because to get higher teacher salaries, the system has to change. Schools need staffing policies that provide teachers with raises. And pensions must be reformed so teachers can have more pay today, not in 30 years when they retire. In other words, teachers need to start asking the question: “What did you spend our money on?”

The post School Administrators, What Did You Spend Your Money On? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Given that teachers will be a constituency that would be significantly affected by any changes to pensions in the state, we thought it wise to ask them what they think, both about their current pensions as well as possible alternative arrangements. We worked with both district and charter school leaders to cast a wide net and include as broad a range of viewpoints as we could.

Unfortunately, not long after we put our survey in the field, one of the state’s teachers’ unions instructed its members not to participate in our data collection. It’s unfortunate, but at this stage, not unexpected.

While it significantly curtailed our sample, 53 teachers did choose to respond, and we thought their voices deserved to be heard—even when they disagreed with some of the stances that Show-Me Institute writers have taken in the past. Accordingly, in addition to the complete survey results we have included an appendix with every open response that teachers gave—the good, the bad, and the ugly.

We encourage you to give the paper a read. Teachers have complicated and often conflicting views on their pensions as well as alternatives. Understanding those views will improve public pension policy.

The post Teachers’ Opinions of Missouri’s Public School Retirement System appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Unfortunately, there is a terrible myth going around about teachers. This myth is pervasive and has been around for decades. It is the belief that teachers are badly underpaid.

Jay Greene, Distinguished Professor of Education Policy at the University of Arkansas, wrote about it in his influential 2005 book, “Education Myths: What Special-Interest Groups Want You to Believe about Our Schools and Why It Isn’t So.” Greene argued that when we compare a teacher’s hourly rate to those of other professionals, the pay is quite comparable. He also noted that we must consider other employment benefits, such as health care and retirement, which are typically more generous in education than the private sector.

Despite these arguments, the myth of grossly underpaid teachers has persisted. Recently, an Education Next poll asked respondents if they thought teacher pay should increase, decrease, or stay the same. Overwhelmingly, respondents said we should “increase” (47%) or “greatly increase” (14%) teacher pay. That in and of itself isn’t telling; if it were feasible, most of us would happily pay teachers more. The telling part is what happens when survey participants are given actual teacher salaries. When people are told how much teachers are paid, support for pay raises drops.

Most people greatly underestimate how much teaches actually paid. In the survey, the average guess for the national average teacher salary was $40,587. That is $17,672 less than the actual average of $58,258. It is also less than the average here in Missouri, where the average total teacher salary in 2016 was $49,060. In Saint Louis City and County, the average climbs to $58,701 (author calculations).

 About two years ago I had to battle this teacher pay myth in my own home. My son came home from school saying teachers didn’t make very much money, at least that’s what his teacher said. I said, “I bet she makes more than me.” So, we looked it up (both of our salaries are public information). As it turns out, his teacher made several thousand more than I do.

The problem with the teacher pay myth is that it undermines a very noble and valuable profession. As Harvard education professor, Marty West suggests, “To the extent that the public has a falsely low impression of [how] much teachers earn, that only makes it harder for us to attract talented individuals into the teaching profession.”

 If we keep perpetuating the notion that teaching is a thankless job and teachers are underpaid, we shouldn’t be surprised when we have teacher shortages. Instead, let’s be honest—teaching is a great profession and the pay isn’t bad!

The post Teachers Are Great, and the Pay Isn’t Bad! appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

• 98% of educators surveyed believe teachers should have the right to choose an association that best fits their needs. Missouri teachers do have this freedom. However, while the teacher may benefit from the professional development opportunities and liability insurance their association offers, teachers don’t have a choice as to who represents them during negotiations over salary and benefits.
• 68% of members would prefer to negotiate their own contract. Wouldn’t it be nice if a teacher who works twice as hard as other teachers and increases academic achievement more than other teachers could ask for a raise? This is unheard of in education, where 84 percent of AAE members say collective negotiations do little to recognize excellent teachers. No wonder schools have such a difficult time holding onto great teachers! They can’t reward them appropriately.
• Only 8% of educators surveyed reported ever having participated in a union certification election. That means that an overwhelming majority of teachers surveyed have never had the chance to vote for which union represents them. Can you imagine if you never got the chance to vote for an elected official—state representative, governor, congresswoman—and the elected official stayed in office indefinitely?

Regular union elections ensure that government employees like teachers have the opportunity to vote for the union or professional association that best represents their interests. While education analysts at the Show-Me Institute often advocate for more choice for students, teachers need choice, too. Teachers need the freedom to decide who represents them at the bargaining table. Whether that’s the individual teacher or a preferred association, teachers should have the freedom to choose. 

The post Teacher Survey Makes Case for More Government Employee Freedom appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

One proposal to fix this problem would restructure the process by which a government workplace becomes unionized by holding elections for unionized government employees every two years. In these elections, public employees would be able to keep their union, choose another union, or forgo union representation altogether.

For workers, that could mean serious money.

Consider the firefighters in Chesterfield. A union firefighter in Chesterfield pays $2,169.18 a year in union dues. While some might feel that this is money well spent, other firefighters may take a dim view of the value they're getting for the price—perhaps preferring to save or spend that money on other needs in their households. Shouldn’t our public employees, from firefighters to teachers and social workers, have some choice over this portion of their paycheck?

Regular union elections give workers this choice. If they had union elections and chose to boot out the union for the next two years, they’d save a little over $4,300. If this didn’t work out, they could always go back to the status quo. And they’d be $4,300 richer for it.

Union elections not only give workers the option of going without a union or signing up with a new union, but it also preserves the right of workers to keep their union if they believe it gives them the best deal. And it’s this freedom to choose that’s really valuable.

The post The Value of Union Elections appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

A good illustration of this problem can be found in Springfield, Missouri. Springfield School District has long had teachers represented by both the Missouri State Teachers Association (MSTA) and the Missouri National Education Association (MNEA). In 2010, MNEA won an election awarding it the privilege to be the exclusive representative for teachers in collective bargaining sessions with the district. This meant that MNEA, and only MNEA, could negotiate with the district on behalf of the teachers.

When MNEA excluded nonmembers from discussions on whether to ratify the new union contract, MSTA sued. And lost. As the exclusive representative, MNEA is free to represent workers the way it sees fit. It does not have to include members of a rival union in its deliberation process.

Still, this may not seem very fair to a longtime MSTA member who only recently lost her ability to participate in internal school district politics because of the exclusive representative election. But with recertification elections, her voice can be heard even if her teachers association is not currently the exclusive representative.

With recertification elections, in order for an association to continue to act as the only association able to negotiate on behalf of employees, that association must be re-elected every couple of years. This would prevent an association from winning an election once, and then representing employees for years after the association has lost most of its supporters. It also would empower employees who belong to another association, because the exclusive representative would either have to do a good job of representing everyone’s interests or risk being voted out of office and replaced with a competitor.

Recertification elections are a lot like American democracy where a new party can be put in control of Congress every two years. Congress is by no means a perfect institution, but by requiring our representatives to stand for regular elections, we ensure some level of accountability. Teachers who feel that they don’t have a say in negotiations with their employer, such as MSTA members in Springfield, should clamor for recertification elections. It may be one of the best policy reforms we have that preserves existing rights while empowering workers to hold their representatives accountable.

The post How to Ensure Springfield Teachers’ Voices Are Heard appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

There is no doubt that the Normandy School District needed to cut some teachers. However, the number of teachers laid off in Normandy will be higher because of state tenure laws and the district’s collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with the Normandy National Education Association. Both state statutes (RSMo 168.124) and the CBA dictate that new teachers must be laid off before tenured teachers.

When districts engage in these seniority-based layoff policies, instead of a policy based on the effectiveness of the teacher, they ultimately lay off more teachers. A new teacher makes less money than an experienced teacher, although they may or may not be more effective.

The average teacher salary in Normandy last year was just more than $60,000, but a non-tenured teacher with four years of experience earns little more than $40,000. That means the district would have to lay off 1.5 non-tenured teachers to equal the salary of one of the district’s average teachers.

Let’s put this into perspective. The district is laying off 71 teachers. If the laid off teachers represented the average teacher, the district would save nearly $4.3 million in annual salaries. If they laid off all novice teachers with four years of experience, they would cut less than $2.9 million in annual salaries — a difference of more than $1.4 million.

The “last in, first out” policies enshrined in state law and in the district’s CBA will undoubtedly lead to larger class sizes than having a policy based on merit.

The post Collective Bargaining + Tenure = More Teacher Layoffs In Normandy appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

While I respect his right to express his opinions, I am not taking a stance on whether he should be fired. I am not privy to all of the charges and evidence brought against him and there very well could be reasons unrelated to his views that have landed him in this situation. Rather, I think this is the perfect opportunity to discuss why teachers should support school choice.

The Joplin School District has the corner on teaching jobs in Joplin. In economic speak, this is called a monopsony. Whereas a monopoly means having a single provider of goods or services, a monopsony means having a single buyer of goods or services. Buyers or employers with a monopsony control the market and are able to dictate terms to the supplier — in this case, the teacher. In most cities, public school districts have a monopsony on the teaching jobs.

The way we have structured our education system has created this monopsony. The state has created school districts and students are required to attend those district schools, unless they can be homeschooled or afford private school. This gives the district in each town control over almost all of the teaching jobs and hampers the prospects for teachers.

When districts have a monopsony on teaching jobs, teachers have little ability to seek out a school that aligns with their values and beliefs. Rather, they have to align with the district’s thinking on issues, such as teaching practices, achievement testing, discipline policies, standards, and possibly even political issues. In school choice systems, many different types of schools exist. This allows teachers to be choosy about where they work.

Take, for example, the website myedmatch.com. It is essentially an online dating site for teachers and schools, allowing teachers to find the school that fits them. This concept is foreign to most educators because they have not had the ability to enter a true market for their labor.

Great teachers may also benefit from school choice through increased salaries. The Joplin School District pays teachers based on experience and degrees. They have no incentive to offer good teachers more money. If schools were competing for the best teachers, however, they might receive pay increases.

Essentially, school choice breaks up the monopsony that districts have on teaching jobs. It gives individual educators more freedom to seek out the teaching post that is the best fit, and increases the market competition for their talents.

If Joplin had a robust school choice system, Turner’s dismissal would be a non-issue. When he realized his school was unhappy with him, he could have searched for employment at a school that more closely aligns with his values and rewards his skill set.

All teachers, including Randy Turner, have the right to express their opinions in the marketplace of ideas. They should also have the ability to express their beliefs in the marketplace for jobs. For this reason alone, teachers should support school choice.

James V. Shuls is the education policy analyst at the Show-Me Institute, which promotes market solutions for Missouri public policy.

The post Monopsony: Why Teachers Should Support School Choice appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

We asked them, for example, to assemble puzzles and to play memory games while throwing tennis balls at a target.

When the subjects were offered big rewards, they did poorly on the puzzles.

I have no doubt that Ariely and his collaborators ran their experiments under rigorous laboratory conditions, but it’s a stretch to conclude from them that merit pay is bad. What goes on in the laboratory is far removed from day-to-day classroom activities. Good teaching depends more on verbal and interpersonal skills than on hand-eye coordination. And a controlled experiment with tennis balls is of necessity finished within minutes, whereas teaching takes place over the course of many months. The long work of establishing a rapport with students and building knowledge isn’t comparable to putting a little puzzle together.

To learn the true effects of bonuses and incentives, it’s better to look at studies that examine how real teachers in schools respond to merit pay.

The post Why I’m Still in Favor of Merit Pay for Teachers appeared first on Show-Me Institute.