Performance-Related Pay for Teachers: A Policy Prognosis

Abstract

This article explores the concept of performance-related pay for teachers. Performance-related pay (PRP) can take a number of forms, but is essentially a system of remuneration based fully or partially on the assessment and measurement of an employee’s productivity, performance, or skills. In 1992 a number of references to the introduction of PRP were made by New Zealand Government Ministers and the Education Forum1 indicating that performance-related pay for teachers may be on the Government’s industrial relations agenda.This article reviews the recent reforms of educational administration and education sector industrial relations and argues that the introduction of performance-related pay for teachers is ideologically consistent with these reforms, particularly the devolution of staff management to school level and the introduction of the bulk funding of teachers salaries. While performance-related pay may appear to be a perfectly sound concept, overseas experience indicates that there are problems in its application to the teaching profession. These problems are elaborated on in the discussion that follows.The article concludes that performance-related pay for teachers is unlikely to be introduced without the full implementation of the bulk funding of teachers’ salaries and further devolution of staff management responsibilities to boards of trustees.