Teachers’ pay
教师薪酬
Better marks, more money
学生成绩好，收入不会少
Jul 10th 2008 | WASHINGTON, DC
From The Economist print edition
An idea to improve and revive the capital’s woeful schools
改善提高华盛顿较差学校的举措
BAD schools, the left insists, are bad because they do not have enough money. The nation’s capital somewhat undermines this theory. Spending per pupil in Washington, DC, is a whopping 50% higher than the national average, yet the city’s public schools are atrocious. If it were a state, its pupils’ test scores would rank dead last.
左翼人士说：差学校之所以差，是因为缺钱。不过我们国家首都的情况在一定程度上否定了这一说法。在华盛顿特区，用在每个学生身上的花费要比全国平均水平高出足足50%，尽管如此，这里的公立学校还是很差劲。如果把华盛顿算作一个州，那么其学生测验成绩将在全国排名倒数第一。
Some schools struggle with the basics, such as discipline. Until last year, for example, the Johnson Middle School “had a nightclub on every floor”, says Clarence Burrell, a youth adviser at the school. There would be dozens of kids hanging out on each corridor during classes, schoolboys “with their shirts off getting massages” from female classmates and fights “all the time”, he says.
一些学校连纪律等一些基本方面都搞不好。例如去年以前，约翰逊中学”教学楼每层都有一个夜总会”，该校年轻学业顾问Clarence Burrell说。上课期间，总有那么几十个孩子聚在在走廊里，男孩子们”脱下衬衣”，让班上的女同学”按摩”，并且”总是”打斗。
Mr Burrell, a tough-looking reformed convict, was hired by LifeSTARTS, a local charity, to help restore order. With his four colleagues, he pays attention to the most disruptive kids. He listens to them. He nudges them to pipe down and study. He offers his own “hectic” life as a cautionary tale. “Jail is ten times worse than school,” he warns young troublemakers. “It’s a long time, just you in that cell with a bunch of dudes.”
Clarence Burrell看起来非常严厉，他以前犯过罪，现在已经改过自新，被当地慈善机构LifeSTARTS雇佣，帮助学校恢复秩序。他和四位同事开始关注那些最为捣蛋的学生。他倾听他们心声，说服他们安心学习。还把自己以前”酷酷”的生活讲述给他们，让他们引以为戒。”监狱里要比学校糟糕10倍”，他警告这些老是制造麻烦的年轻人说，”你会感觉时间是那么漫长，牢房里只有你和一帮狱友。”
Programmes such as LifeSTARTS are a first step. But what the system needs is fundamental reform. Teachers are virtually unsackable and paid by seniority. Such incentives attract the lazy and mediocre and repel the talented or diligent. Michelle Rhee, the city’s dynamic new schools chancellor, is trying to change them.
像LifeSTARTS这样的一些计划只是第一步，整个教育体系需要的是根本性变革。教师们现在可以说是无法解雇，并且是按资历获取薪酬。这样就引来了一些平庸懒散之辈，赶跑了那些有天份和勤奋的教师。华盛顿特区新任教育主管Michelle Rhee精力充沛，正试图改变这一局面。
Ms Rhee is thrashing out a deal with union leaders that would raise teachers’ wages dramatically. Starting salaries would leap from about $40,000 to $78,000, and wages for the best performers would double to about $130,000 a year. In return, teachers would lose tenure and be paid according to merit, measured in part by their students’ results. Current teachers would have a choice: they could join the new system or stay in the old one. New hires would have to join the new system. Over time, the quality and morale of teachers in Washington should soar. “Imagine the kind of talent the hard-pressed system could attract,” drools the Washington Post.
她正在与教师工会领导人商讨一项大幅提高教师工资的协议。该项交易达成以后，教师的起步工资将从目前的4万美元一跃到7万8千美元，而那些教学业绩突出的年薪可达13万美元。另一方面，教师们则将失去”铁饭碗”，按照实际表现取酬，包括学生成绩。现任教师们面临着选择：是加入新的体系还是留在旧体系。不过新聘用教师需要加入新体系。这样，华盛顿地区教师们的质量和士气会逐步大幅提升。”可以想象，这一充满压力的新体系将会吸引来人才”，《华盛顿邮报》如是说。
But wouldn’t all this require a huge expansion of the school budget? Perhaps not. The current system is staggeringly inefficient. The city employs an army of educational bureaucrats and has twice as many schools as it needs. It pays to heat and air-condition some schools that are only a quarter full. Insiders reckon that, within a few years, the new pay deal could be wholly financed by cutting waste. And in the short term private donors are willing to shoulder much of the cost.
可是难道这一切不需要大幅增加学校预算吗？或许不用。现在的体系效果极差。华盛顿特区雇佣着一大群教育官僚，学校数目也是实际所需的两倍。一些学校中学生数只是其能力的四分之一，然而政府却支付着取暖和空调费用。知情人士估计：用不了几年，通过减少浪费，就可以完全支付新体系所需的费用了。而短期之内，私人捐资者们还是愿意承担相当一部分费用的。
The plan’s boosters call it revolutionary, in that it applies to public schools a principle-reward good work and you get more of it-that every other employer has known for centuries. But it will be still-born if the Washington teachers’ union does not agree to it. Local union leaders rather like the idea of higher pay, but the big national unions are appalled at the notion that any teachers might give up tenure. Fearing an unwelcome precedent, they are leaning on the local union to kill the deal.
支持新体系的人们称之为具有革命意义，因为它将在公立学校内实施这样一条几百年来教师的雇主们都知道的原则–工作表现好会得到奖励，得到的薪酬也就越多。不过如果华盛顿教师工会不同意这一原则，那么它将胎死腹中。本地工会领导人们倒是很喜欢高薪酬，可国内一些大的教师工会组织却对教师有可能要被迫放弃 “铁饭碗”这一点感到震惊。他们担心这会成为一个不好的先例，因此正向华盛顿教师工会施加压力否定这一协议。
Washington may be extreme, but it is symptomatic of a wider malaise. America’s best universities are still the world’s best and many of its public schools are excellent, too. But far too many are awful. Overall, the high-school graduation rate is slipping. And the generation now entering the workforce is less well educated, on average, than the generation about to retire-a fact that bodes ill for the nation’s prosperity. Any idea that might stop this slide is welcome.
华盛顿的情况或许只是一个极端，但是反映了一个更大的问题。美国的一流大学在世界上仍处于领先地位，而美国的学多公立学校虽然也非常优秀，但更多的公立学校比较差劲。总体来看，高中毕业率正在下滑，比起步入退休年龄的这一代人，加入劳动大军的年轻一代所受教育要差，这对于国家未来的繁荣可不是个好兆头。因此，任何能够阻止这一颓势的想法都是受欢迎的。
译者： charlesbryan http://www.ecocn.org/forum/viewthread.php?tid=12591&extra=page%3D1&page=1