Text 2. Performance pay 'benefits' teachers

1. What do you know about PRP – Performance Related Pay? What professions does it work best for?

2. Read the text, define its main idea.

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Performance Related Pay Case Study

In a controversial move in the UK education sector, the Department for Education has insisted that teachers' pay must be linked to performance as part of its plans to “modernise” public sector services - including workplace reform. The department is also considering giving individual schools more power to set pay rates for their staff.

The government is strongly of the view that the priority is not a general increase in pay above the rate of inflation but instead promoting workforce reform and tackling workload issues. In 2002, the government introduced a performance-related bonus scheme in order to boost teachers' pay and help retain staff. Experienced teachers can apply for a one-off bonus of ₤2,000. Currently, almost all teachers who apply for the performance pay get it. They can only apply after they have taught for six years.

A recent study has suggested that there is no evidence that paying teachers performance bonuses leads to better exam results or attracts more recruits to the profession. Researchers from the Institute of Education in London found little evidence to suggest the payments had improved results or attracted more people into teaching. The study argued that it is difficult to determine the impact of any one teacher on a pupil's progress: a pupil may have private tuition, help at home, or any number of external influences. It is impossible to state objectively whether performance-related pay has positive effects on pupil learning outcomes. Market theories do not necessarily work in the public sector. A bricklayer may lay more bricks if paid a bonus, but this does not apply to teachers, who are highly motivated professionals already working to maximum capacity.

The researchers even argue that bonus payments could be counter-productive because teachers were used to working together instead of competing with each other. It is a "difficult if not impossible task" to devise a performance-related pay system for teachers that makes them work harder and more productively, does not need expensive monitoring, encourages teamwork and discourages teaching to the test and grade inflation. Other countries, including the USA, have paid teachers performance bonuses but the study suggests they provide little convincing evidence for or against performance-related pay.

In a report - Milestone or Millstone? - Industry in Education suggests teachers have everything to gain and nothing to lose from the implementation of performance management. Teachers should earn the same as a middle professional in industry, but must be prepared to accept performance appraisals. Performance management results in high performers feeling valued and this fact almost universally outweighs the disadvantages of some poorer performers preferring a uniform system of reward.

Proponents of the system say that there is no better outcome from a management system than one that makes the best performers feel valued, particularly in a profession which relies totally on the performance of its staff. Head teachers, who are paid as managers, must behave as such and sell the system to their staff, it is suggested.

Contradiction

The Trades Union Congress backed the concerns of teaching unions and urged the government to drop its plans for performance related pay. Opposition to payment by results on the part of teachers continues unabated. The government has failed to recognise that young people are deterred from coming into education and that performance-related pay strengthens their refusal to consider education as a career for the future, teachers say.

A spokesperson for the National Union of Teachers told BBC News Online that the research commissioned by the union found that performance-related pay in education would not work. However, headteachers welcomed the proposals, which they said would help them stem the flow of the best teachers out of the profession. Good and excellent teachers have absolutely nothing to fear from a new pay scheme that puts the quality of teaching and learning at the heart of the education process.

(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/922109.stm)

3. Paraphrase the underlined word combinations and translate them into Russian.

4. Answer the following questions.

1. What was the purpose of introducing performance-related pay in the education sector?

2. Is there any direct evidence that paying teachers performance bonuses leads to better exam results?

3. What does a pupil’s progress depend upon? Can we trace the impact of one particular teacher on the academic achievement of a pupil?

4. How might PRP tell on the interpersonal relations among the teaching staff within a school?

5. How did head teachers feel about the proposal?

5. Choose the opinion closest to how you feel about the issue of PRP and enlarge it with your own comments.

• The extension of performance related pay based on pupil progress to the main scale will further demoralise and demotivate teachers and make the profession less attractive…

• Good and excellent teachers have absolutely nothing to fear from a new pay scheme that puts the quality of teaching and learning at the heart of the education process…

• [PRP] will do little to facilitate recruitment and retention of high-quality graduates…

• …performance-related pay in education would not work…

• …there is no evidence that paying teachers performance bonuses leads to better exam results…

• …teachers have everything to gain and nothing to lose from the implementation of performance management…

6. Translate into English:

1) Департамент образования Великобритании настаивает на том, что оплата труда учителей должна зависеть от успеваемости класса. 2) Невозможно объективно оценить вклад отдельного учителя в повышение успеваемости: ученик может заниматься с репетитором или получать помощь от кого-либо еще. 3) Постановка оплаты в зависимость от успеваемости может привести к завышению оценок или к тому, что обучение сведется к натаскиванию на тесты. 4) Сторонники новой системы оплаты утверждают, что введение премий за высокое качество работы прекратит отток лучших учителей из образовательного сектора. 5) В соответствии с новым законом руководство школ получит полномочия устанавливать размер ставок заработной платы своих работников. 6) Опытные учителя могут получить единоразовую премию. 7) Противники выплаты премий за высокую успеваемость утверждают, что такая система приведет к обратным результатам.

Rendering

Render the following texts in English and comment on them.