Hosted by The Center for
Education Reform
Hosted by The Center for
Education Reform
The futility of teachers 'working to the rule'
By Ed Linz
The Fairfax Journal,
June 12, 2001
I teach physics in a Fairfax County public high school. For the past two months, my colleagues and I used various methods in an attempt to obtain increased pay.
One tactic was to dramatize to the public the importance of teachers by "working to the rule."
Instead of staying beyond designated work hours to assist students, set up labs, grade papers, plan lessons, conduct conferences with parents, etc., we departed school in a demonstrably public manner.
Of course, many of us performed most of the same work at home.
Unfortunately, all such work actions are hopelessly futile. Teachers just do not "get it."
As public employees, we are inevitably in direct competition with every other group of public servants, whether it be police officers, firefighters, health department workers or computer maintenance personnel.
Each group can make a strong argument that its services are just as important as, or perhaps even more important than, the services teachers provide.
And don't count on the public for much support beyond lip service.
When your house is on fire, your car is stolen, your neighbor is diagnosed with a communicable disease or you cannot obtain tax information because government computers are down, you are not going to rank teachers as more important than
the public servant whose services you desperately need.
The point is that as long as teachers are public employees, they will remain necessarily mired in a fixed-salary structure. They'll remain somewhere in the middle of a large food chain made up of thousands of employees, all with claims for higher salaries at least as compelling as theirs.
And because most taxpayers are not exactly champing at the bit to pay higher taxed to fund raises for each of these categories of public workers, the prospect of significant pay raises for teachers is bleak, with or without job action.
Teacher compensation will remain low as long as teachers are paid with public funds.
But that fact of life is not open for discussion among teachers or our union representatives. It is the forbidden topic.
To mention privatization, or even vouchers, is tantamount to treason in most teacher lounges and lunchrooms.
The result is painfully predictable. Teachers complain bitterly about their level of compensation, but refuse to consider the only realistic alternative to improve their pay.
One route to immediate improvement in teacher compensation and in student performance would be to move toward a voucher program for parents with children in public schools.
Look at the working model, which has functioned well for the past 100 years, i.e. higher education. It is essentially a voucher system.
Students are free to choose when they wish to attend college. They are not constrained to attend the University that happens to be within a boundary drawn by some bureaucrat, but can choose to apply to the school of their choice.
Here in Virginia, students can attend any state university at tuition rates subsidized by taxpayers, or can even attend private schools in Virginia while receiving tuition assistance from the state.
Isn't this a voucher system? And doesn't our federal tax system provide income-based vouchers for public
education via the tax code (education credits)?
Because of competition to obtain students, universities attempt to recruit the best faculty. This competition leads to increased salaries for the top professors, even at state universities.
Pay follows supply and demand, and demonstrated competence, rather than the strict system of longevity currently in place in public primary and secondary schools.
For the first time, teachers would have opportunities to be monetarily rewarded for classroom excellence. Under the current system, there is no incentive to become a better teacher because pay is in no way related to that aspect of performance, i.e., student achievement.
Although such an approach frightens many teachers, competition will translate into improved pay for those who perform well.
Of course, those teachers who perform poorly will be invited to show immediate improvement or shift professions.
And it is thought that leads to silence within the faculty dining rooms on vouchers or other changes to the status quo.
So, my colleagues, you cannot have it both ways. Either accept the fact that you remain mired in pay mediocrity as a public employee in competition with every other public worker,
or start to examine some meaningful alternatives.
They just might improve your salary and make us all better teachers.
Oh, and in the process, we just might improve the education of our children.
Ed Linz teaches physics at West Springfield High School.
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