WILL-O'-THE-WISP ASSESSMENTS OF TEACHING PERFORMANCE

Abstract

A running controversy, which pops up periodically from province to province and school system to school system, centres on the possibility (or impossibility) of relating teachers' salaries to quality of performance. We have not heard the end of it, by far; for it seems clear that, with teachers constituting a steadily growing proportion of Canada's work force (one in forty-two as of 1959, one in thirty-five as of 1964), the time will come when it will not be possible for the level of salaries to rise nearly high enough to attract and retain truly outstanding teachers. Indeed, we lose many such teachers now; as exceptionally good teachers they are promoted out of teaching and into administration, for our salary schedules do provide differentials for increased responsibility. Yet, what more vital responsibility is there in a school than the direct responsibility of the teacher to help youngsters learn?