Merit pay based on student achievement should be a significant component of K-12 teacher compensatio

Resolved: Merit pay based on student achievement should be a significant component of K-12 teacher compensation in United States public schools My partner and I stand in firm affirmation of today's resolution. Our first contention is that Merit based pay brings about educational progression in students. Education Resource Information Center has recently published a 6 year analysis of the merit based pay effects on the learning of students and reported significant gains in teacher moral and overall scores as a result. What the study details as well which is important to note, is that failed school districts with the presence of merit based programs does not necessarily mean the fault lies on the merit based pay system itself, rather a failure in other areas of the school system such as good regulation oversight for the prerequisite for positive outcomes of merit pay rely on good oversight in the school system. Meaning past failures my opponents may use must precisely outline that merit based pay was the initial cause not the other negative factors the E.R.I.C outlines. The idea and concept of merit based pay is so innovative and works because as the institute for educational finance and Governance of Stanford University puts it, "Merit based pay is a way to get public schools to follow a sensible business protocol: use money to reward the employees who do the best work, and thereby inspire other workers to do a better job as a result of economic pressure." Specific proof of this Merit Miracle is from North Carolina which drastically improved as a result of merit based pay. Terry Stoops, JLF education policy analyst explored the performance of the 30 Guilford County schools that participated in the Mission Possible program last school year. Mission possible is the name given to the merit based program currently in place. She reported "Teacher and administrator turnover has decreased, the percentage of schools that met No Child Left Behind performance standards increased, and the percentage of students who met North Carolina testing standards increased," Stoops said. "Graduation rates are on the rise, and the school climate has improved considerably." Dropout rates would be impacted at such a degree from merit pay that Mayor Michael Nutter of Philadelphia suggested that dropout rates could be cut in half with the usage of merit pay. The question is now probably raised in your mind judge, how is this possible, how does the miracle that is the merit program feasible, reliable and the just? And the answer revolves around the teachers. Through the merit pay based on student achievement, teachers of high quality are drawn to the teacher profession; moral is raised, both factors leading to a good student. The problem today is under the single salary system, good teachers and bad teachers are paid the same wage limiting the want to progress student achievement for that takes work on the teacher and little to nothing is gained in return. Now my opponents may say that good teachers would want to teach for the love of teaching, although this goes on, this a decreasing phenomenon. The current phenomenon shows that these are a dying generation of teachers that can only be reintroduced through the merit based pay system. Currently new teachers with higher academic ability as measured by SAT/ACT scores tend to exit the teaching profession at a faster rate as a result of the lack of want to progress student achievement because of the singe salary system, as reported by Michael Podgursky Department of Economics at the University of Missouri in 2002. The report goes on to say that this trend would be reversed with the usage and implementation of the affirmative because the incentive to be a good teacher would increase. Our next contention is that by increasing scores as a result of the affirmative, the United States would benefit overall. This is so for as previously proven, graduation rates would increase through the affirmation. With this trend, the economic sector would benefit tremendously. Lee Luff, executive director of the Anderson Area Chamber of Commerce, said higher graduation rates would bring more jobs to the county which increase economic development, he as well states "for every $1 of public money spent on dropout prevention efforts which the merit pay program achieves, the benefit to the community is more than $7." It is for these reasons we affirm today's resolution.