Public schools in Oregon need a change. It seems many Oregonians feel this way, because there are two measures on the November ballot specifically addressing schools. We’ve all experienced or heard about bad teachers, and we know of good teachers as well, but the system needs a shake-up. The question is, what sort of shake-up? We’d prefer moving away from standardized tests and the demand for quality without funding, and instead focus on the ability of students to think and learn, and the innovation and expertise of teachers who are well-trained, well-paid and monitored for performance.
Measure 1 makes the Legislature provide funding for any school quality goals they establish, and we think this is a wise step. High quality schools and teachers require a little more money. Our students deserve the very best teachers, devoted to their task. The next generation is our most valuable resource, and spending on schools yields less crime, lower law enforcement costs and a better economy.
Measure 95 is more contentious. The law would provide a shake-up by basing teachers’ pay on job performance, instead of the current system, which gives teachers raises for seniority and for continuing education. This is a worthy goal, but how job performance is defined and how much teachers are currently paid must be considered. And Measure 95 does exactly what Measure 1 wants to prevent: It sets a school quality goal, but provides no money to achieve it. The state estimates Measure 95 will cost public schools $46 million in the first three years. That money could be spent on education rather than standardized testing.
Measure 95 doesn’t specify how to judge teachers’ performance, but Oregon is fond of standardized testing, which is used for the school report cards. Using these tests to measure a teacher’s performance would be just plain wrong. Standardized tests only reflect a student’s abilities at one moment, they don’t take into account cultural and economic factors and they don’t reflect the classroom environment in which teachers must work. Under Measure 95, what will happen to teachers in communities with a high percentage of students with family, economic or behavioral problems? Teachers won’t want to work in those communities and they’ll be unfairly punished for problems beyond their control.
The measure might motivate teachers to work harder with the problem students in order to bring test scores up. But a heavy reliance on standardized tests generally makes teachers teach to the tests, which means children’s education is limited to a very narrow set of facts and exercises. In that setting, teachers don’t have extra time to focus on the disadvantaged students, and they don’t have time to worry about teaching kids to think. Pounding a specific list of facts into a child’s head doesn’t necessarily result in an educated student. Teaching kids takes time, money and a more complicated and subtle evaluation process than a multiple-choice exam. And for real motivation, why not give bonuses to teachers who go above and beyond the call of duty?
Teaching is the most valuable service we can provide for the future. Teachers should be paid more, and they should be held to a high standard of excellence. But the teachers’ union in Oregon seems to have a knee-jerk reaction to any proposal to monitor or base pay on teacher performance.
Maybe this resistance comes because teachers are paid so little. According to the Oregon School Boards Association, the average salary in Oregon is $37,403, and the national average is $40,582 — and this is with at least a bachelor’s degree. If Americans value the education of their children, they should be willing to pay a premium for good teachers, especially if stringent performance standards are enacted.
But the union might simply be unwilling to allow serious evaluation of teachers, and it needs to lower that wall. Pay should be tied to performance — as well as education, training, skills and past performance — if that performance can be measured adequately.
There are many factors in the better-school equation, however. If we had a simultaneous commitment from parents to be more involved in their children’s schools, from unions to be open to new ways of thinking about teacher salaries, from teachers to re-evaluate their teaching methods, from the taxpayers to provide enough funding so that the best and the brightest choose a teaching career, and from the Legislature to ensure that the methods of evaluating teachers and students actually reflect learning, then we would really be shaking up the system.
Measure 95 gives teachers some tough challenges, but it doesn’t provide the right solutions. Measure 1, on the other hand, is moving in the right direction by requiring the Legislature to provide money when they demand quality. Vote yes on Measure 1 and no on Measure 95.