The hubris and shame of Jacksonville’s education community.

I can just imagine it now, the business community demanding and fair enough coming up with the money for merit pay and the district saying, you know merit pay has basically never worked before. There is one study that said it worked on the elementary level for two years but they had to pay the teachers 20,000 dollars over two years (which up to a few days ago was an insanely high amount). The district then saying but what has worked is addressing the whole child and provide wrap around services. What has worked is smaller classes and putting in supports for both children and teachers alike.

I then imagine the business community collectively pounding on the table and saying, we’ll just pay teachers even more.

Who am I kidding I seriously doubt the district stood up for what schools, teachers and kids need.

The one study that said merit pay worked filled 88% of the slots available with the best of the best teachers and it didn’t do a bit of good at the middle school level, they didn’t even try it at the high school level and within three years 40% of the teachers had left.

We may have some modest improvements with the Vitti-Chartrand plan but I feel very comfortable saying unless we put in supports for teachers and children they will be short lived and when the money runs out a lot of people will be pointing fingers, most likely at teachers. .

I also feel comfortable saying shame on you business community and the district for throwing money at the problem and not putting in place those things that will make our schools successful.

The business community has demonstrated such hubris demanding the district do something that is doomed to fail and the district such shame for going along.