Alert Archive 2/15/05

Press Senate Ed. to Defeat Gov.'s Merit Pay Plan

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has proposed an onerous "merit pay" plan that would gut collective bargaining, eliminate seniority, and undermine due process protections for educators.

The bill - SCAx1 1 by Sen. George Runner (R-Antelope Valley) - is a special session measure that would put the issue before the voters. As a special session measure, the bill can move quickly - and it would go into effect as soon as it is passed.

If the governor is successful, the question could come before voters as early as this November.

The bill is scheduled to come up in the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday, February 23.

SCAx1 1 Would Gut Employee Rights

The governor's special session bill, SCAX1 1 by Senator George Runner (R-Antelope Valley), would eviscerate collective bargaining agreements by requiring any employment decision, including hiring, fixing or increasing compensation, promoting, demoting, terminating, transferring, or assigning an employee to be based on student test scores.

The bill specifically excludes experience or seniority from being used. The measure would require annual performance assessments of teachers every year based on criteria set by the school board and standardized test scores.

SCAX1 1 would also require that a teacher receive 10 annual consecutive satisfactory evaluations in order to be eligible for permanent status. Two unsatisfactory evaluations could result in termination.

The provisions of this bill would supersede any conflicting provisions of a local collective bargaining agreement that is entered into, or renewed or extended, on or after the effective date of the measure.

CTA Members:

Write or call Senate Education Committee members - and urge your colleagues to do the same. See the attached list. Here is background information you can use in formulating your communications:

Key Points

• The Governor's proposals on education, including his merit pay plan, are a smoke screen designed to divert public attention away from the fact that he broke his promise to adequately fund public schools.
• The plan would make it harder to recruit and retain quality teachers - especially in our schools of greatest need. If teacher pay is dependent upon student test scores, it will be nearly impossible to attract teachers to low-income schools or schools where a majority of students are still learning to speak English. Many people will not even consider entering the profession if their education, training and experience are no longer factors for compensation.
• The merit pay plan would be costly. Based upon the Denver ProComp plan, implementing merit pay would cost California taxpayers $1.88 billion or require the state to raise taxes by $301 per student. California's failed merit pay system is no longer funded. The Certificated Staff Performance Incentive Awards Program and Governor's Performance Awards program awarded teachers by schools for improving student test scores has been scrapped due to funding cuts. In addition, the proposed merit pay plan would require more costly student testing. The costs of two tests (pre and post instruction) taken by all students in every subject would be astronomical.
• The plan provides no incentive for students to do their best work. Nothing in this proposal creates a system where students will want to do their best work on tests. In fact, students could simply turn in a blank test without any consequences.
• All California teachers merit good pay. According to the RAND Corporation report that was released January 3, 2005, California teachers are among the lowest paid in the country. When adjusted for inflation and cost of living, the average teacher salary is $39,000, making us 32nd nationwide and dead last among the most populous states.
• No accommodation has been made for the training of administrators in this type of evaluation system. This merit pay plan would cost $787 million for the additional administrators needed to do evaluations.
• The plan would create a patronage system. Eliminating an unbiased pay scale based on educational training and teaching experience would invite back the abuses that caused districts to create the single salary schedule. These employment abuses included nepotism, political patronage, political and social bias, favoritism, bossism, bureaucratic despotism, economic pressures of eliminating high paid teachers in favor of low paid teachers, and awarding teachers for irrelevant reasons. Prior to the single salary schedule, men and women often were not paid the same for teaching the same class.
• The plan is unnecessary because merit pay can already be bargained. The Educational Employment Relations Act already provides for bargaining an alternative pay scale. No school district has made an effort to even try to bargain merit pay since the enactment of these two subsections.
• Members of the Senate Education Committee
•  Remember Tip O'Neill's advice: "all politics is local." Contact the members of the Senate Education Committee at their district offices. Note: some lawmakers have more than one office in their district. Contact the nearest one to where you live or work.