[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 24 (Thursday, February 8, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1772-S1774]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         TEACHER INCENTIVE FUND

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I wish to speak about a casualty of the 
budget process. It is a very disheartening development, and I hope it 
is an oversight, not the first symbol of the new Democratic Congress's 
education agenda because I don't think it should be, and I cannot 
believe that it would be. I don't believe that the Senator from 
Massachusetts, the Senator from Iowa, the Senator from Rhode Island, 
and others who care about education would agree that killing the 
Teacher Incentive Fund should be held up and said here is the way the 
Democrats plan to approach education. But, in fact, that is what came 
over from the House of Representatives. What they did was kill a 
Federal program, passed in a bipartisan way in No Child Left Behind 
called the Teacher Incentive Fund. They reduced the Teacher Incentive 
Fund from $100 million a year to $200,000 in this current year. What 
does the program do? It helps reward outstanding teachers and 
principals of children who attend low-income, poor-performing schools. 
That is what it does. This cut threatens a crucial effort to improve 
the Memphis schools and also other schools all across our country in 16 
major cities and States.

  It is a disheartening development and one I hope will change. The 
loudest criticism I hear of the No Child Left Behind bill is it is not 
properly funded. What kind of response is it to say we are going to 
knock $100 million out of the most important program that helps to 
train teachers and principals to help low-income children in poor-
performing schools succeed? That doesn't make much sense to me.
  So I have submitted an amendment--it is on file--which would increase 
the teacher incentive fund from $200,000 this year to $99 million, 
which is the level that was approved in the appropriations bill. It is 
also the level President Bush requested for the current year. The 
funding comes out of funds available under the education title of the 
Labor, HHS, Education section of the joint funding resolution. Unlike a 
traditional appropriations bill, the resolution doesn't fully allocate 
all of the dollars under the education title. So as a result, I have 
been advised by the Legislative Counsel's Office that our amendment 
doesn't need an offset.
  I will add that President Bush, in the budget we received this week, 
has asked for $200 million for next year. So this would permit us to do 
what was intended to be done by the No Child Left Behind bill.
  I ask unanimous consent that my amendment be printed in the Record at 
the end of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See Exhibit 1.)
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, let me mention a few of the details of 
the Teacher Incentive Fund, so that we can understand what happened in 
the House of Representatives. The Democratic majority in the House 
reduced the teacher incentive fund from $99 million to $200,000. The 
proposed cut jeopardizes 5-year grants that were made to 16 grantees, 
largely serving big-city schools and low-income students with low 
academic achievement. The cut will take away funds from Chicago, 
Denver, Memphis, Houston, Dallas, and Philadelphia. The proposed cut 
will take away funds from State programs in New Mexico and South 
Carolina. Many of these programs were developed in full consultation 
with teachers and principals and with their unions. As an example, 
Philadelphia's grant application was written and endorsed by the local 
teachers union. So I am trying to figure out who is against this? It 
would not be the teachers, principals, or the districts. Neither 
Democrats nor Republicans. So how did it get cut from $100 million to 
$200,000?
  One of the most critical problems we have to solve today is how to 
retain outstanding teachers and principals. The more we understand 
about low-performing schools, the more we understand that, except for 
the parent, the most important people in that child's ability to 
succeed are the teacher and the principal. The quality of the teacher 
and the quality of the school leaders are the most important factors. 
The elimination of funding, as has been done by the joint funding 
resolution, could have a significant impact upon the Teacher Incentive 
Fund. As a result, for example, of the joint funding resolution, the 
Department of Education has already decided that they will have to 
delay the national evaluation of the Teacher Incentive Fund until 2008. 
So we have delayed, for a year, helping these children be exposed to 
teachers and principals who have more capacity, and we won't learn 
anything from that evaluation for another extra year.
  The proposed cut in funding in the current year will undermine the 
current grant competition that is going on. Applications are due on 
February 12, 2007. So say you are sitting in Providence, Knoxville or 
San Francisco, and you are in the midst of an application to bring in 
New Leaders for New Schools or some other group, they say to the school 
district: OK, we will train all your teachers, send them to the Wharton 
School in the summer and work with them for a year, and on a continuing 
basis we will help these principals and teachers; we will help the 
principals become better school leaders. But then the New Leaders for 
New Schools will say you have to give the principal some autonomy, let 
them hire and fire the best teachers, let them make decisions. So there 
is this alliance. In many cases, the teachers union is involved, as in 
the Philadelphia case. They make concessions. So everybody is working 
together to try to say: What can we do to help these low-performing 
schools succeed?
  Today, in a roundtable we had about No Child Left Behind, I suggested 
we are not talking about No Child Left Behind in the correct way. We 
are catching people doing things wrong instead of catching people doing 
things right. The truth of the matter is that across our country we 
have about 100,000 schools, more or less, and in about 75 percent of 
those schools, they are succeeding in what we call adequate yearly 
progress. Those schools are succeeding in adequate yearly progress. 
Now, those schools, I would say, are high-achieving schools. What we 
find is most of the schools I would call achieving schools. Any school 
that has succeeded in No Child Left Behind for a couple of years I 
would call a highest achieving school. One which has succeeded for 1 
year would be a high-achieving school. One with only one subgroup of 
children who don't quite make the standards, I would call that an 
achieving school. So we have mainly 15, 20 percent of our schools where 
we need to go to work and do things differently.
  These children can succeed. Memphis has a large number of low-
performing schools, as we call them, but it is not because the children 
cannot learn. I was there during spring break last year at one of the 
new public charter schools in Memphis. They go to school early in the 
morning and leave at 5 in the afternoon. They were in AP biology 
courses in the 10th grade. They can all learn. They needed extra help 
in a different way, and the difference it has made there starts with a 
good school leader and an excellent teacher. Memphis plans to take this 
money from the Teacher Incentive Fund and take every single one of its 
principals through this year-long training, the summer programs, the 
continuing education, and then Memphis decided to give those teachers 
autonomy.
  So that is what we are killing when we kill this program, not just in 
Memphis, but in many other school districts. The northern New Mexico 
network, the DC public schools, the Chicago public schools, Denver, 
Mare Island Technology Academy in California, Houston, Guilford County, 
NC, Alaska, the whole State of South Carolina, a couple of districts in 
Texas--they are all in the middle of this. They are making applications 
for more. They expect these to be 5-year grants. They are doing what we 
asked them to do, and then we come along and kill the program right in 
the middle of the year.

[[Page S1773]]

  I ask unanimous consent to print after my remarks a list of the 
current grantees and programs.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See Exhibit 1.)
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, following that, I ask unanimous consent 
to print in the Record a letter from Secretary Margaret Spellings of 
the Department of Education pointing out what difficulty this decision 
by the House of Representatives will cause to the teacher incentive 
fund.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See Exhibit 2.)
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, finally, let me make this observation. 
I was visited today by representatives of the Tennessee Education 
Association. I have not always gotten along well with the Tennessee 
Education Association because of the subject we are discussing today. 
In 1983, I proposed the first master teacher program in the country, 
the first attempt by a State to pay teachers more for teaching well and 
to reward principals in the same way. The National Education 
Association went apoplectic for over a year. We had a brawl for a year 
and a half. We finally passed a program and our Career Ladder Program 
lasted for several years, until I got out of office is really what 
happened, and then it gradually went away. Mr. President, 10,000 
teachers were rewarded, paid more, their retirement pay was more, and 
we talked about that today. I appreciated very much their visit because 
this includes some teachers who were part of that Career Ladder 
Program. They are the leadership of the teachers' union, the teachers' 
association in Tennessee. They came to see me about it, and they were 
very honest.
  They said any program that picks one teacher out and rewards 
outstanding teaching or rewards an outstanding principal is difficult 
to do because it is hard to make it fair. But we must do it. Almost 
everyone agrees that if we make any progress in education, especially 
with low-income children in poor performing schools, we have to find a 
way to pay good teachers more and good principals more and keep them in 
those schools. We have to do it.
  So this teacher incentive fund is a real casualty here, and I hope 
the majority whip, the assistant Democratic leader--he is here--I know 
he cares deeply about education, about the program in Chicago which is 
part of this.
  Maybe it is an oversight. Maybe it is a casualty that both 
Republicans and Democrats have had to deal with over the past 2 months. 
What I hope is, if there are any amendments allowed to this joint 
funding resolution, this amendment will be one of them. If it is not, I 
hope we can work together in the Senate, as well as in the House, and 
do what President Bush has asked us to do, not only put $200 million in 
for next year, but send a signal to the big city school districts 
across America: Don't give up, we want to help you train and hire 
outstanding teachers and outstanding principals.

                               Exhibit 1

 (Purpose: To provide additional funds for the Teacher Incentive Fund)

       On page 72, line 20, strike ``of which not to exceed 
     $200,000'' and insert ``of which $99,000,000''.
                                  ____


                               Exhibit 2

                            Current Grantees


                Northern New Mexico Network (New Mexico)

       The Northern New Mexico Network for Rural Education, a Non-
     Profit Organization, is partnering with four New Mexico 
     school districts: Espanola Schools, Springer Schools, 
     Cimarron Schools and Des Moines Schools. They seek funding 
     for the Teacher Incentive Fund to implement a performance-
     based compensation program to serve a region of the state 
     where high levels of poverty, high concentrations of Native 
     American and Hispanic students, and extreme rural conditions 
     pose unique challenges to public education systems. Three of 
     the school districts--Cimarron, Des Moines and Springer--are 
     small (less than 500 students), and serve a large 
     geographical area--all over 1,000 square miles. The fourth 
     district, Espanola, serves almost 5,000 students


                New Leaders, Inc. (D.C. Public Schools)

       This project includes a coalition among D.C. Public 
     Schools, New Leaders for New Schools, Mathematica, 
     Teachscape, and Standard & Poors to provide direct 
     compensation to teachers and principals who have demonstrated 
     their ability to move student achievement. D.C. Public 
     Schools' currently works with the Center for Performance 
     Assessment to ``incentivize'' the creation of more standards 
     and data-driven classrooms and schools. The project plans to 
     complement this current effort in the District of Columbia 
     where the achievement gap is particularly troubling due to 
     the over 90 percent of public school students coming from 
     poverty stricken families.


                   Chicago Public Schools (Illinois)

       The Chicago Public Schools, in collaboration with the 
     National Institute for Excellence in Teaching (NIET), 
     proposes the Recognizing Excellence in Academic Leadership 
     (REAL) program. At the center of REAL is the NIET Teacher 
     Advancement Program (TAP). The TAP performance-based 
     compensation system--including multiple evaluations and 
     opportunities for new roles and responsibilities--will drive 
     recruitment, development, and retention of quality staff in 
     40 high need schools that serve approximately 24,000 students 
     in the Chicago public school system.


   School District No. 1 for the City and County of Denver (Colorado)

       The Denver Public Schools proposes a twofold district-wide 
     expansion of its Professional Compensation System for 
     Teachers (ProComp). First, Denver PS will develop, implement, 
     and evaluate a performance-based compensation system for 
     principals through a national strategic partnership with New 
     Leaders for New Schools. Second, Denver PS will strengthen 
     its professional development, information and technology, and 
     student assessment systems to ensure ProComp is consistently 
     and rigorously implemented district-wide.


                New Leaders, Inc. (Memphis City Schools)

       This project includes a coalition among Memphis City 
     Schools, New Leaders for New Schools, Mathematica, 
     Teachscape, and Standard & Poors to maximize their prospects 
     of attracting, developing, supporting, and retaining a 
     community of high-performing educators to drive academic 
     achievement in the short and long-term. The project will 
     likely span 17 schools that directly affect 10,000 students 
     in Memphis City Schools--the largest school district in the 
     state of Tennessee and the 21st largest in the nation.


              Mare Island Technology Academy (California)

       Mare Island Technical Academy, an LEA, proposes to expand a 
     current project to award incentives to teachers and 
     principals instrumental in increasing student achievement. It 
     will also award incentives to those taking the lead in 
     implementing Strategic Plan and Professional Learning 
     Communities initiatives in 2 independent middle and high 
     school charter schools serving a total of 780 students 
     with 32 teachers and 2.5 principals/administrators, in 
     Vallejo, CA. Mare Island attracts a percentage of 
     neighborhood students from 2 elementary schools within a 
     block of Mare Island: Loma Vista with a 61.4% and 
     Wiedenmann with a 67.0% free or reducedprice lunch rate.


              houston independent school district (texas)

       The Houston Independent School District is the largest 
     public school district in Texas and the seventh largest in 
     the United States. Houston ISD proposes Project S.M.A.R.T. 
     (Strategies for Motivating and Rewarding Teachers), an 
     incentive plan for teachers that focuses on teacher 
     effectiveness and growth in student learning. The proposed 
     performance-pay program will provide incentives to 109 
     teachers and principals at Houston ISD campuses. A total of 
     27 schools have been targeted for inclusion of the S.M.A.R.T. 
     program using TIP funds.


                guilford county schools (north carolina)

       Guilford County Schools has proposed a financial 
     recruitment/retention project for the 2006-2007 school year 
     called Mission Possible and plans to expand the program to an 
     additional seven schools using TIF funds. The seven schools 
     proposed for expansion include: Bessemer Elementary, Cone 
     Elementary, Falkener Elementary, Union Hill Elementary, Allen 
     Middle, Aycock Middle, and Penn Griffin Middle.


         new leaders, inc. (charter schools in various states)

       This project includes a coalition among New Leaders for New 
     Schools, Mathematica, and most of the nation's highest-
     performing charter schools and charter school networks, 
     including the national KIPP network, Achievement First, 
     Uncommon Schools, Aspire Public Schools, YES College Prep 
     Schools--and others. The project will likely span 47 schools, 
     47 principals, and 1,186 teachers in charter schools 
     throughout the nation.


                    chugach school district (alaska)

       Chugach School District serves as the fiscal agent of the 
     Alaska Teacher and Principal Incentive Project, created in 
     partnership with Lake and Peninsula School District, Kuspuk 
     School District and Chugach (the fiscal agent). The Alaska 
     Department of Education and Early Development and the non-
     profit Re-Inventing Schools Coalition are also participating 
     in this proposed project. This project expands on Alaska's 
     performance pay initiative funded by the Alaska Legislature.


        south carolina department of education (south carolina)

       This project, which is a modified version of an existing 
     Teacher Advancement Program (TAP), aims to implement a 
     performance-based compensation system to address problems 
     with recruitment and retention in 23

[[Page S1774]]

     high-need schools in six districts. By the fifth year of the 
     project, SC TIF has the potential to affect more than 60,000 
     children and 5,000 teachers and principals. These 
     modifications include higher and varied teacher bonuses, the 
     introduction of principal and assistant principal bonuses, 
     more competitive Master and Mentor Teacher addendums, a new 
     focus on marketing and recruiting, raising the value-added 
     percentage in the performance pay from 50% to 60%, using MAP 
     tests to give K-3 teachers an individual value-added score, 
     and inclusion of related arts in the individual value-added 
     gains calculations.


               dallas independent school district (texas)

       For the past decade, the Dallas ISD has provided incentives 
     to teachers, principals, and other campus staff based on the 
     value-added performance of their students under the 
     Outstanding School Performance Award program. This project 
     builds on this history and existing apparatus to identify and 
     reward effective principals based on a combination of direct 
     and value-added measures of student achievement and reward 
     effective teachers based on value-added measures of their 
     students' achievement. In addition, the project includes 
     refinement of the Dallas database for tracking student-
     teacher assignments; incentives for principals and 
     teachers to participate in substantive, high-standards 
     professional development; incentives for highly effective 
     teachers to move to and stay in high needs campuses; and 
     procedures for insuring the integrity of test results.


             school district of philadelphia (pennsylvania)

       The overall purpose of Philadelphia's initiative is to 
     pilot a performance-based staff development and compensation 
     system that provides teachers and principals with clear 
     incentives that are directly tied to student achievement 
     growth and classroom observations conducted according to an 
     objective, standards-based rubric at multiple points during 
     each school year. Twenty high-need urban elementary schools 
     (grades 3-8) that have demonstrated high degrees of faculty 
     buy-in will participate in the pilot. Leaders from the School 
     District of Philadelphia's administration and from the two 
     unions representing all Philadelphia teachers and principals 
     have designed the pilot and will oversee its implementation.


                  ohio department of education (ohio)

       Key strategies of the Ohio Teacher Incentive Fund (OTIF) 
     include implementing the Teacher Advancement Program (TAP) in 
     the Cincinnati and Columbus City Schools, expanding the 
     Toledo Review and Alternative Compensation System (TRACS) in 
     the Toledo City Schools, and developing and implementing the 
     Cleveland Teacher Incentive System, a program modeled on 
     TRACS, in the Cleveland City Schools. OTIP is a cooperative 
     venture of the Ohio Department of Education; Columbus, 
     Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Toledo City Schools; and the 
     National Institute for Excellence in Teaching.


                eagle county school district (colorado)

       In the past five years, Eagle County School District has 
     invested over $4.5 million (not including performance awards) 
     to implement a performance-based compensation system for 
     teachers and principals based on the Teacher Advancement 
     Program (TAP). This project is an expansion of the program 
     and will utilize TIP grant funding to improve the quality of 
     Master and Mentor teachers through increased salary 
     augmentations and increased training. It will cover 13 high-
     need schools.


                 weld county school district (colorado)

       This project will be implemented in the 4 high-need schools 
     in the Weld County School District. The district currently 
     ranks last in teacher compensation compared to neighboring 
     districts. The project objectives state that by year 2, a 
     comprehensive principal and teacher differentiated 
     compensation system based on student achievement gains and 
     classroom evaluations will be fully operational. The 
     Superintendent of Student Achievement of this district will 
     manage the project.
                                  ____


                               Exhibit 3


                                   The Secretary of Education,

                                 Washington, DC, February 8, 2007.
     Hon. Lamar Alexander,
     U.S. Senate,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Alexander: Thank you for your efforts to amend 
     the Joint Funding Resolution, H.R. 20, to provide level 
     funding ($99 million) for the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF).
       As you may know, the lack of a fiscal year 2007 
     appropriation for TIF would have a significant impact on the 
     program. The Department (ED) remains concerned that a lack of 
     funding for TIF in fiscal year 2007 would jeopardize our 
     ability to make timely continuation funding available for 
     current grant recipients. While ED has reserved $8.8 million 
     from fiscal year 2006 funds to cover the increased costs 
     proposed for the second year of operation for the 16 current 
     TIF grantees, this amount will not cover all continuation 
     costs for grantees.
       A lack of fiscal year 2007 funding for TIF would also 
     significantly limit our ability to support technical 
     assistance to TIF grantees and ensure that information on 
     teacher and principal compensation reform is available not 
     only to TIF grantees, but also to the general public.
       Finally, a lack of fiscal year 2007 funding would impact 
     our ability to begin a national evaluation of the TIF 
     program, which Congress called for when appropriating funds 
     for this program. Our planned evaluation will be delayed 
     until fiscal year 2008 unless funds are appropriated.
       It should also be noted that a lack of funding in fiscal 
     year 2007 may undermine the current TIF grant competition 
     that is underway (with applications due on February 12, 
     2007). Potential grantees may be dissuaded from applying for 
     TIF grants or spending time and resources developing high-
     quality applications if they believe the program's funding is 
     in jeopardy.
       Again, I thank you for your leadership on this important 
     issue. Please do not hesitate to call if I can answer any 
     additional questions.
           Sincerely,
                                               Margaret Spellings.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority whip.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate is in morning business. The Senator 
from Illinois may speak for 10 minutes.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I say to my colleague from Tennessee, 
whose interest in education is well recognized, I couldn't agree with 
him more. Not only is this program important, it is important to me. 
When the superintendent of the Chicago Public School System, Arnie 
Duncan, called me yesterday and said we need this money, I said to him: 
I know you do. It breaks my heart that we cannot give it to you at this 
moment.
  I can go through the sordid history that brought us to this 
continuing resolution--our failure to pass the appropriations bills in 
the normal fashion last year, extending the Government on a piecemeal 
basis with a CR, as we call them, for a few months, and now facing the 
awesome task of funding the rest of the year with certainly limitations 
in funding that have caused a great deal of deprivation. This is a 
clear illustration and example of a program that is worth funding and 
that should be funded.
  I say to my friend from Tennessee, if we cannot resolve it in this 
particular bill--and I doubt that we can because of the extraordinary 
circumstances--please let me join him and let's have others join in 
making sure this program is solid and funded for the next fiscal year. 
It is a good program, an excellent program. I want to see it move 
forward.
  The quality of teachers may be the single greatest determinant in the 
success of education. I certainly want to join the Senator from 
Tennessee in making that happen.

                          ____________________