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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To not understand why teachers should object to performance related pay?

718 replies

Dolcelatte · 18/10/2013 09:08

After all, it happens in most other sectors, so why should teachers be any different. I am not trying to be controversial and there will undoubtedly be others with a better understanding of the issues. However, I don't understand the objections in principle. Why shouldn't remuneration be dependent upon performance?

OP posts:
TheFallenMadonna · 20/10/2013 11:08

Capability does not take a year. Is it a while since you were a governor?

Arisbottle · 20/10/2013 11:13

In most other sectors it is expected that staff will take place in activities which are not specifically part of the contract and to work beyond the contracted hours. For those working in my sector,the law, this is completely routine. I am not saying that it is right, just that this is life in the real world.

Even someone like me who seems to do much less than other teachers and certainly isn't driven by a sense of vocation does more than my contracted hours. I cannot think of a single teacher who just does their directed hours and no more.

Original poster
Dolcelatte · 20/10/2013 11:17

Noble - I wasn't referring to anyone in particular, simply saying that a lot of jobs are more demanding these days. We are in a recession and a lot of sectors have been hit; pay rises have been at zero or negligible for a lot of people in a wide spectrum of different jobs. Many lawyers I know are just grateful to have jobs, even though their targets have increased significantly.

Like I say, I have great admiration for teachers; they are doing one of the most important jobs in educating the next generation. But I do think some of them come over on this thread as being a bit 'bolshie' and 'jobsworth'. Do you really think a change in government will make a difference?

OP posts:
noblegiraffe · 20/10/2013 11:19

You only go up the pay scale automatically for 6 years. After that, pay rises are linked to performance or promotion, except the annual % increase (when there isn't a pay freeze) to account for inflation

Arisbottle · 20/10/2013 11:20

Who is coming over as a bit jobsworth or bolishie. I suspect I am the most jobsworth on this thread, it would be courteous if you acknowledged if y meant me.

Has any teacher said that they are the only people with a demanding job?

SanityClause · 20/10/2013 11:22

DD1 has been given GCSE targets of A* for 12 GCSEs (or equivalent in ICT). Do you think that it is likely she will get that?

But, if she doesn't, her teachers will be deemed to have failed. Even if she gets an A due to a grade boundary being changed, or similar.

So, I think perhaps it's not that PRP is necessarily a bad thing, just the way it will be measured.

noblegiraffe · 20/10/2013 11:23

Do you really think a change in government will make a difference?

Oh dear god yes. Even just a change in education minister would.

TheFallenMadonna · 20/10/2013 11:24

If this thread has confirmed your view that some teachers are jobsworths, then I think its a bit daft to say its not any posters in particular Hmm

TheFallenMadonna · 20/10/2013 11:25

I am bolshie though, for sure!

FamiliesShareGerms · 20/10/2013 11:31

I think good head teachers know who their best and worst teachers are, and it's not all about quantative outcomes, but qualitative inputs.

PRP is prevalent elsewhere in the public sector, and I agree that the tax payer is entitled to seek value for money, including in how it rewards good performance. The system in most civil service departments involves ranking all members of staff at the same grade in order, reflecting both delivery and behaviour (ie what and how). The top 20% get a bonus and - when there is money to do so - a payrise; the middle 70% get a pay rise; the bottom 10% are told they must improve and get nothing. (The exact %ages and reward amounts can vary from department to department, but the structure is similar).

I don't see in principle why this system couldn't work for teachers.

noblegiraffe · 20/10/2013 11:38

There aren't enough people in a school on the same pay grade as each other to make ranking them work. Your school might only have two NQTs, you can't rank them fairly against each other and give one a pay rise and one not. You also couldn't rank an NQT fairly against another main scale pay teacher further up the scale.

You'd also have problems deciding who was a better teacher between a maths and a PE teacher - very different jobs.

neverputasockinatoaster · 20/10/2013 11:49

I am facing capability by the end of the year...... I will not meet my Performance Management Targets.

I have year 2. A number of them have been identified as being capable of achieving level 3. Sadly, their levels have been inflated by previous teachers who have been pressurised to show progress and accelerated progress at that by an SLT obsessed with an OFSTED outstanding grade....

I will not lie. At the end of the year I will assess those children honestly. They will have made progress and good progress at that but not on paper because they have come to me with inflated grades. I will not shaft the teacher following me but I have been shafted by the one before and she was shafted by the one before her.............

I have no true issue with PRP for teachers but the measurement has to be fair.

I am also about to discuss with my DH giving up my UPS status.

NomDeClavier · 20/10/2013 11:50

My mother and I were talking about this. I work in a country where PRP will never happen. Ever. There is no threshold, teachers get in as early as possible and progress automatically up the pay scale even when on leave or seconded elsewhere. She is on the UK, has not passed threshold and doesn't want to because if she did then she can't drop back so she's refused several projects she would find interesting and I feel the school and the county have lost put on valuable expertise. Teaching is, incidentally, her second career so we DC were always a consideration and it's only in the past 3 years since my DBro left school she has more flexibility (he required a lot of support due to severe dyslexia, confidemce issues - the kind of pupil teachers facing PRP dread!). The current system isn't effective....

What we concluded we really have an issue with is a) the accountability of heads in this scheme and b) the lack of clear ways performance can actually be assessed. We don't agree with linking it to results which is probably how it would end up! It assumes every teacher wants more money and to work harder, that PT teachers can't do extra and that there's a simple effort in = results out.

PRP could be done via bands rather than automatic progression. Pass your NQT and go up a band, set a bunch of criteria for the next band - designed to be achieved in one year or two that you can apply for - and go up, and so on. When you're apply for a new job you can apply in any band. Much like the private sector in every other industry really. That would allow very good and experienced teachers who had taken on extra to move back down if they want. If you move from being SEN coordinator to being a class teacher elsewhere then you shouldn't be on the same pay, nor should the school have to scramble round trying to find something they can do to justify their pay. There should still be performance appraisal and management within a job but would prevent heads managing out facing who don't fit or older candidates because that would be discrimination.

I guess that's more responsibility related pay but it would be a decent compromise (in our opinion!).

Arisbottle · 20/10/2013 11:52

Not meeting your performance management targets should not , by itself , trigger capability .

chibi · 20/10/2013 11:59

i am part time, 4 days a week

i coordinate a whole school pastoral issue. i run two clubs (one of which also involves weekend day trips several times a year, and one residential). i have a form group. i am mentoring a new teacher (formally- this involves a weekly meeting, lesson obs etc)

my students' targets are so high it is a near mathematical impossibility to get positive value added. they achieve their targets though (a few do better, a few not, it evens out to 0 VA)

am i working hard enough yet? am i value for money? maybe i am a bolshie jobsworth because i have refused to come in unpaid on my day off.

i don't want praise, or more money or a trophy. i would like to not have my profession denigrated,or told i am lazy and i need to get with the times.

some hope.

BoneyBackJefferson · 20/10/2013 12:14

lucy

How do you know that they were "crap"?

FamiliesShareGerms · 20/10/2013 12:19

Small schools can join up with others to make cohorts large enough to consider, noblegiraffe, which would also assist moderation and consistency on what "good" looks like.

BoneyBackJefferson · 20/10/2013 12:30

"If you move from being SEN coordinator to being a class teacher elsewhere then you shouldn't be on the same pay"

Why shouldn't they be on the same pay?

In some schools SENCO is not a full time position and is a TLR addition to the teachers pay, in other schools it is a non teaching position.

Which post should get more pay?

noblegiraffe · 20/10/2013 12:44

My school isn't a small school, 1500 kids, maths department of ten teachers. Our neighbouring school is part of a federation of academies and will be doing its own thing re pay.

Primary schools have fewer teachers than my department. How many primaries would need to club together before there were enough teachers on the same pay grade for comparison?

BoneyBackJefferson · 20/10/2013 12:46

FamiliesShareGerms
"Small schools can join up with others to make cohorts large enough to consider"

That would only work if they all had the same policies and targets.

Talkinpeace · 20/10/2013 12:49

PRP always distorts behaviour towards the measurable target.
My industry is completely non unionised and PRP dropped back out of fashion when it was realised that it did not work as planned.

FamiliesShareGerms · 20/10/2013 12:53

PRP only works effectively when it underpins the whole year, rather thn being something done at the end of thhe year. So yes, schools would need to agree targets, priorities etc and communicate them to staff at the start of the year. And refer to them during mid-year appraisals.

neverputasockinatoaster · 20/10/2013 12:55

Arisbottle - in the meeting I had with my HT at the end of last year when the targets for this year were set I was told if I did not meet my performance management targets then I would be put on capability.

Arisbottle · 20/10/2013 12:55

Families, that should be what happens now

redpipe · 20/10/2013 12:56

Because performance related pay ALWAYS leads to focusing on the set measures rather than all areas of importance. It also leads to lots of wasted time checking and ticking boxes.

Even in jobs like banking where it could be argued that it is easy to measure performance based upon profits made, it has led to short term focus thus the terrible financial situation the banks ended up in.

Pay the right wage to the right people and give them the autonomy to do the job.