Organization implications - Essay Example

The merit pay systems emphasizes on the fact that teachers are to be paid for their achievement in the classroom as opposed to their seniority or the number of ed-school credits that they have collected. This paper will discuss the merit pay system and teacher performance in public schools The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 put the merit system principles into law, specifically section 2301 of title 5 of the U.S. Code. It was set as a national policy intended “to provide the people of the United States with a competent, honest, and productive workforce.

and to improve the quality of public service, Federal personnel management should be implemented consistent with merit system principles” (Pfiffner & Brook, 2000). Since then, the merit system and its principles have been implemented both in the public sector and in private sector in the country. The merit system can be defined as a personnel system applied in the process of hiring and promoting government employees based on merit to obtain the highest efficiency in public personnel functions.

The application of the merit system in the public education sector has brought about unending controversies especially with the merit pay issue. The merit pay systems emphasizes on the fact that teachers are to be paid for their achievement in the classroom as opposed to their seniority or the number of ed-school credits that they have collected as it has been done from the 1920s period. Reformers in the education system including the government have emphasized that the merit pay will encourage high performing teachers to do well and drive the lazy ones away, thereby improving the performance of public schools.

However, teachers’ unions have continually opposed the move stating that there is no objective way of measuring the classroom performance of a teacher. In addition to this, opposing views have pointed to the fact that the merit pay system has a high chance of failing