Whoring for ARRA money: SB5X-1

I know it's a good idea over all, but it still seems a little unseemly for California to change its considered education policy for money.

SBX5-1 has passed the senate and is in the assembly. It permits tying teacher salaries to student achievement. As a state, we don't believe in tying teacher salaries to student achievement. It's just too hard a problem for professional educators to solve, although we will have to do so. As I said before, it should be possible to figure out the influence of individual teachers by handing the problem to statisticians. Let them gather whatever data we need and do a regression analysis (i.e., do magic).

But there's no good reason to think the legislature and CDE will do it right, so this bill amounts to agreeing to degrade our system for cash. Bend over and grab your ankles, Uncle ARRA has some money for you.