A whopping 78 percent of people believe it should be easier to fire underperforming teachers, according to a new poll.
The Associated Press-Stanford University poll also found that 57 percent of people believe teachers are underpaid. Seven percent believe teachers are underpaid, while the rest believe they’re paid the right amount.
And on that touchy subject of linking students’ test scores to teacher effectiveness — think Impact, D.C.’s own controversial evaluation tool -— half of those polled said teachers’ salaries should be based on a combination of student scores on state exams and evaluations by local school officials (Impact on the nose). Just one in five wanted teachers’ salaries to be wholly score-based, while one in four said they thought school officials’ evaluations should take up the whole pie.
It’s not just bad teachers that people are hungry to oust: 71 percent say it should be easier to fire principals at schools where students are struggling.
However, just 35 percent say that a large number of bad teachers is a serious problem for American schools, and 45 percent blame teachers’ unions for bad teachers — compare that to more than half of those polled who blamed parents and school officials, and the 55 percent who said keeping and recruiting quality teachers was the main issue.
