Pinal Today

The Maricopa County, Arizona, Unified School District (MUSD) Governing Board has voted to continue offering performance pay for teachers and counselors.

The bonuses total about $4,000 and will be funded from Arizona’s Classroom Site Fund, according to a Sept. 19 report by In Maricopa.

“Last year, the average was $4,200,” MUSD Human Resources Director, Tom Beckett said. “This year, we rolled the pay into salaries. Part of the requirement to receive the classroom site fund dollars is that districts still have to have a performance pay element in their compensation plan. We wanted a mechanism that was more stable, and this provides that.”

Beckett said the pay structure is a benefit for everyone.

“This gets us away from the pressure on those employees worrying about how they are being evaluated by a principal for that bonus and allows them to just focus on the students,” Beckett said.

Beckett also said pay being affected by performance is generally seen as ineffective for educators.

“Hitting employees in the pocketbook might work in some industries, but it doesn’t make sense in education," he said. "We work with the teachers if they fall short to try to make them a better teacher. If they can’t handle that, we have a responsibility to have the most effective teachers in the classroom."

The key, Beckett said, was making sure to hire a strong force of educators from the start.

“We feel like we hire well, we encourage our teachers to grow and learn, and we do everything we can to make them successful,” Beckett said.