0.3 Cook, l. (october 2011). will a twenty percent salary bonus  (Page 3/9)

Principal bonuses limited to improvement in student and school achievement

The bottom-line purpose for offering bonuses to principals is to eventually improve student achievement and the quality of teacher instruction that helps produce that improvement, and that has begun. As reported in the Star Advertiser from Hawaii (Essoyan, 2010), a program has begun for teachers and principals whereby principals could earn an annual $10,000 bonus. The Charlotte Observer recently reported a visit from U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan during which he talked about Charlotte’s program to recruit excellent principals, help them build high quality teams, and then give them three years to show significant improvement. For that commitment, principals receive a ten percent pay hike and teachers get a $20,000 bonus package over three years (Perlmutt, 2010). Smydo (2007) described in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette a pay-for-performance project that makes principals eligible for increases up to $2,000 on base pay and bonuses up to $10,000 for improvement in students’ academic growth. Other than in the McCardle article, no studies were found that measured the effect of providing incentives to attract high quality candidates to principal positions in high-needs, low-performing schools.

Plcs’ attitudes about working in low-performing schools

Our department faculty concluded that if we are to help students understand the need for quality principals in high-needs, low-performing schools, if we are to develop instructional practices and materials that better explain the many positives that come from successful turnaround challenges, and if we are to assist our students in clarifying their attitudes toward working in low-achieving schools, we must first determine how PLCs feel about becoming a turnaround principal in this kind of building. Faculty also concluded it would be helpful to introduce in this study the concept of a motivation or incentive to pursue this kind of principalship. A survey was developed and administered to the continuing participants in the

second year of the department’s ten-year, longitudinal study, especially since this group is a random collection of PLCs from all five centers, including three centers located in urban areas. Along with information related to their level of confidence in performing teacher evaluations and being successful with student and staff discipline challenges, the primary focus of the survey was the degree to which PLCs agreed or disagreed, using a five-point Likert scale, that a 20 percent bonus would motivate them to seek a principal position in a high-needs, low-performing school.

Research questions

1. Does an incentive of at least 20 percent above the principal salary motivate Principal License Completers (PLCs) to accept a position in a high-needs, low-performing building for a minimum of four (4) years?

2. Does gender, years of teaching experience, or already being in a principal position affect PLCs’ attitude toward accepting, in exchange for a 20 percent bonus, a principal position in a low-performing building?