News Briefs
California budget woes doom merit pay
Dec 6, 2007 4:57 PM
California budget woes doom merit pay
Who says state budget shortfalls never do any good? California’s $10 billion deficit is putting a big question mark in front of plans by a blue-ribbon state panel to make individual bonus pay for teachers part of its multibillion-dollar overhaul of state education. As in New York, merit pay is opposed by the state’s teachers unions.
The 15-member Governor’s Committee on Education Excellence concluded that state schools are “hobbled in red tape, riddled with inefficiencies and impossible for parents and students to understand” and that “California’s K-12 education system is broken.”
The committee proposed $6.1 billion in new spending and some controversial changes, including individual performance-based pay for teachers, expanded resources for English Language Learners and a stronger role for the elected superintendent for public instruction — who now has little say in how school systems are managed.
The report was intended to provide a blueprint for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s next legislative initiative: a restructuring of the state’s education system.
No one questions the need to improve California’s public school education, battered since a controversial 1978 ballot proposal limited the amount of assessed property taxes and curtailed the amount of local funds spent on school districts. But the committee’s report arrives as revenues are plummeting in the wake of a housing crisis, and lawmakers face a $10 billion deficit that experts predict will grow.
“Without any added revenues, it looks like we will be holding in abeyance any bills … that provide for comprehensive education reform,” said Gene Mullin, chair of the Assembly’s Education Committee.
Los Angeles Times, Nov. 23
