A forum for independent school educators <ISED-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU> writes:
>A number of non-profits I have worked for have bonus compensation tied to performance
>and I am sure if you look at for profit education management companies like Edison
>Learning (which runs some Philly schools) you will see them there too. In my experience
>the value of these types of incentives are ambiguous. I have seen them motivate and
>stifle. The execution of these kinds of systems in non-profits is very tricky and open
>to abuse with overly loose or strict goals. More often then not I would see them
>eroding the discretion of the Head in relation to the board.
>
>I think that Fred is right to look at compensation and creativity but I believe the are
>symptoms of a larger forces. Throughout the early 90's to mid-2000's many established
>schools made some significant changes. At least in the Washington, DC area it seems
>that the majority of schools undertook major programs of expansion. This echoed
>year-over-year increases in school age children and an increase in available students to
>fill slots. Most schools also sought ways to attract students that went beyond pedagogy
>(echoing the trend from higher ed). Many invested in IT facilities, others with
>expanded sports and rec facilities all of which had costs that were not off-set by
>increased numbers of students and often had to be made up by increased debt, fund
>raising, and tuition.
>
>As financial responsibility increases (especially if it is debt or fundraising) so does
>the salary of the CEO/President/Head, regardless of market sector. It also tends to
>make organizations more conservative because the risk of financial failure is higher.
>This gets worse when revenue is projected to drop (as we see the number of school age
>children dipping through at least 2012). I believe the DC area has seen the financial
>failure of one school a year (on average) since 2005. This will make it far easier for
>a number of smaller, less encumbered schools to jump in in 2018-ish when the
>demographics are on the up-tick and we can start the cycle again.
>
>_J
[ For info on ISED-L see https://www.gds.org/podium/default.aspx?t=128874 ]
Submissions to ISED-L are released under a creative commons, attribution, non-commercial, share-alike license.
RSS Feed, http://listserv.syr.edu/scripts/wa.exe?RSS&L=ISED-L
