Teacher Pay Advancements in the Bay State

Massachusetts' incoming education secretary Paul Reville supports higher salaries for those teachers who take posts in the most challenging schools, such as teaching hard-to-staff subjects such as math, science, and special education and working in schools with dramatically improved performance:

"The larger challenge is to take on the monolithic pay notion and differentiate pay based on skill, knowledge, and assignment, and establish a concept that everyone doesn't have to be paid in the same lock step and lanes."

I am heartened to hear that Reville has recognized the importance of providing teachers with opportunities for better pay that other professionals enjoy. Even leaders at the national level are recognizing the need for reforming teacher pay. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings stated during her visit to Massachusetts, "If schools are to improve the achievement of their lowest-performing students, they should get the best teachers into the neediest schools by rewarding them with higher salaries."

And, most importantly, teachers in Massachusetts who have taken part in grant programs that award teacher bonuses based on performance say the program makes them feel more like a professional.
One teacher quoted in the Boston Globe article said that the extra money, "shows that they respect and value us, and that helps motivate us to keep doing it."

Teachers have a bigger impact on student learning than anything else in schools. They are the single greatest "natural resource" in education and we must begin treating them as so.  I look forward to reading more about the reforms in teacher pay taking place in Massachusetts.