Teachers salaries should be based on their students academic performance

(Please note that this being my first essay, I decided to do it without the time constraint. It took me a good 45-50 mins which is about 20 more than the actual GRE limit.)

Many believe that the teachers should be paid on the basis of their students' academic performances. This is because they believe doing so would actually improve the overall academic performance of the students and that the teachers shall be paid on the basis of their merit in a particular academic year. This argument, however, is a controversial one mainly because it fails to consider the flip side. I do not concur with the aforementioned because of the reasons stated below.

Firstly, a student's performance in an academic year is not a holistic measure of what they learn in the classroom. There are many other factors involved. For instance, many students prefer going to tuitions and attending extra classes just because they think doing so would help escalate their academic grades. As a result, they hardly concentrate in the classroom because they think the topic being covered would be covered in a more profound manner in the tuitions and that they'd be able to grasp more of what is being taught by the tuition personnel. This acts as an impediment to the teachers' efforts to teach in the classrooms. Furthermore, a large part of the academic performance rests solely on the student. A teacher can do only so much to help the students get good grades. If a student develops an interest in the subject and puts his nose to the grindstone to learn each and every concept, he's much more likely to succeed than the student who does little to understand it mainly out of indolence or other distractions. A brilliant teacher is likely to have 10-15 students who score below par, about 20 who score above par and the rest to get an average score out of every 50-60 they teach. The point being is that the teacher cannot account completely for the academic performance of the students and that the responsibility to score good rests heavily on the students' shoulders.

Secondly, if such a methodology were to be employed, many teachers would actually resort to home tutoring primarily because they are more concerned about their salaries than the students' understanding of the subject. In such a case, the situation descends into a tale of greediness and ultimately, it is the students who suffer. Additionally, If home tutoring is made compulsory, the entire schedule of the students is turned upside down. A student, on an average, spends about 6 hours in school. Employing such a policy would mean that the students would have no choice but to attend the extra tuitions even if that's not what they want. If, on an average, a student is made to attend 4 extra tuitions every day, each about an hour long, they'd spend (waste rather) a good 4-5 hours which could have, otherwise, been very well utilized for recreational activities. On returning back home, they'd only have a handful of time to play, do homework, watch TV, undertake household chores etc. Imagine the amount of pressure being put on the students. Consequently, the sleep pattern is affected, the overall physical and mental well being is stagnated and life becomes mundane. In such a situation how can you expect a student to perform well in the exams? The plan ultimately backfires.

Thirdly, since the salaries would fluctuate irrespective of the qualifications of the teachers, it is likely that a teacher with a lower qualification would be paid more than the one with a Ph.D. only because the students under that teacher performed well. This goes to show that merit holds no good in a professional environment.

However, there are a few advantages of adopting this methodology. Firstly, it would ensure that the teachers pay equal attention to all the students. Secondly, they would employ efficient and innovative learning techniques which would benefit the students and thirdly, it would make the job of the teachers rather intimidating. I've come across a few teachers who take the job just to get a year long experience in the field so as to improve their resume so that they can get into good companies and simultaneously, earn a handful whilst in pursuit of the experience. Such teachers do not employ a good teaching technique and the sessions are rather insipid. Employing such a methodology would ensure that the teachers, new as well as the veterans, put enough effort into their teaching so that the students actually learn something good to write about in the exams.

So to conclude, even though there are a few perks of adopting this "salaries based on the performance" methodology, the flip sides are iniquitous as far as the lives of the students are concerned and thus, I strongly believe this shouldn't be done else the lives of the teachers as well as the students would be affected strongly.