APSD Teachers could get 'pay for performance,' attendance incentives

Avoyelles receives $500,000 Teacher Incentive Fund grant

Many Avoyelles Parish teachers who reach their student performance targets this year could earn up to an additional $3,000 from a $500,000 Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) grant, Superintendent Blaine Dauzat told the Avoyelles School Board Executive Committee at its April 25 meeting.

In addition to the individual incentive, all teachers in a school would receive a $1,000 incentive payment if their school reaches its overall goal, Dauzat added.

The incentive payment is based on the number of “state tested” courses a teacher teaches during the school day, but all teachers -- PE, band, other electives not included in state assessment tests -- share in the schoolwide incentive.

Dauzat explained that a teacher who teaches only state tested courses would receive the full incentive. Those teaching some state tested courses would receive a pro-rated incentive payment for reaching their goal in the class or classes.

TIF is a federal program that awards grants to the state, which then distributes smaller grants to rural and/or high-poverty school districts to help improve performance in low-performing schools.

It has also been called a “pay for performance” grant because the incentive payments are based on teachers reaching certain goals.

Eight of the parish’s 10 public schools qualify for the performance incentive. Only Lafargue Elementary and LaSAS are not eligible for the performance incentive payment.

However, the School Board has set aside part of its incentive grant to improve teacher attendance by rewarding any teacher in the school system with a $1,000 incentive payment for perfect attendance and $500 if they miss two days or less. That incentive applies to all 10 schools.

Dauzat said Avoyelles may be the only district with an attendance incentive, but he thinks it is a wise investment of the grant funds.

Dauzat said students do better when a certified teacher is in the classroom, rather than a substitute teacher. Reducing the number of teacher absences will reduce the cost of paying daily substitutes while also ensuring the regular teacher is in the classroom with the students.

The “down side” to the incentive program is that the parish would have to absorb the costs if all teachers and all eight schools hit their student performance scores and a large number of teachers had perfect attendance.

“That’s the kind of ‘problem’ I think we would like to have,” Dauzat told board members.

Approximately $342,000 of the $500,000 grant is dedicated to teacher incentives.

Some of the grant will be used to entice student teachers to do their “residency” in Avoyelles Parish schools.

Dauzat said the parish had no student teachers in the schools this year.

School districts like to have student teachers from area universities for two reasons: (1) it puts teachers in the classroom who have been educated to be a teacher and (2) it is easier to encourage the new teachers to teach in this school district if they are already familiar with the school and have made personal and professional relationships here.

Dauzat said TIF “allows us to reward our teachers who push our kids and get good results.” He said it also rewards teachers who push themselves to achieve their goals.

It was noted that teachers in the two “non-struggling” schools might feel the incentive program is unfair to them, since they are only eligible for the attendance incentives.

Dauzat said the trend in education at the national, state and local levels is to “use more resources in the struggling schools, because that is where we have more students who are struggling and in need of extra assistance.”

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