Teachers to get smaller bonuses

Cuts mean the state won't be paying the $1,500 maximum that it has before.

RALEIGH -- Thousands of North Carolina public schoolteachers will get smaller checks this year because of cuts to the state's bonus program.

State education officials say they can't give the maximum bonus of $1,500 a teacher that's meant as a reward for the performance of their students on state exams. The change means teachers will likely see a few hundred dollars less in their checks.

The severity of the cuts will be announced Thursday by the State Board of Education when teachers find out whether they're eligible for the bonuses this year.

Teachers aren't happy.

"We're expected to do more and more every year but we're not being compensated for it," said Amy Constant, a fifth-grade teacher at Fox Road Elementary School in North Raleigh. "It would be nice if we got recognized for this with full bonuses."

Under the state's ABCs of Public Education testing and accountability program, all the teachers at a school can receive a bonus if the school's students meet expectations on state exams.

Last year, 72 percent of the state's public schools met standards, making teachers eligible for the bonus.

Although state law sets a $1,500 ceiling on each bonus and doesn't specify a minimum, the SBOE has never given less than the maximum amount. Even when the General Assembly has provided less money than needed, state education officials have pulled the money from other parts of the budget to pay the full bonuses.

State education officials had warned this year that $107 million might be needed for bonuses. But in the state budget adopted last month, the General Assembly ordered the SBOE to spend no more than $94.3 million in bonuses, the average amount given over the past 11 years.

"It was just a tight year," said state Senate Majority Leader Tony Rand, a Fayetteville Democrat. "I'm sorry it's not 100 percent, but I'm glad that we were able to give them 90 percent."

The problem now, state educators say, is that they think they would need even more than $107 million to pay the maximum bonus amount. This means the state cap will result in even larger bonus cuts for teachers.

Sheri Strickland, president of the N.C. Association of Educators, the largest group representing the state's teachers, said the bonus cut is particularly bad since teachers will get a smaller raise than Gov . Mike Easley had recommended. Teachers will get an average state raise of 3 percent.

"It's a difficult pill to swallow when they've already done the work to receive the bonus money," Strickland said.

The bonus cut wasn't a source of disappointment for Terry Stoops, an education policy analyst for the John Locke Foundation, a Raleigh think tank that has been critical of the ABCs program. He argues that the bonuses have "become an entitlement" in the minds of teachers.

"The bonuses are too easy to get," Stoops said. "You could be the worst teacher at a good school and still get the bonus."