Most schools or districts around the United States continue to provide teachers with a pay system created in the 1920s known as the “single-salary schedule”, which compensate teachers in view of their years of experience and number of degrees received (Ritter, 2013, p.3). According to Deuren and Evert (2015), through this system, teachers are paid the same regardless of gender, ethnicity or grade level taught; no variation of teacher performance is made. Nonetheless, this system could easily depict that teachers can simply earn income by just teaching the minimum year after year. In all retrospection, policy makers need to know if …show more content…
education system, policy makers, intellectuals, and lawmakers are asking for pay changes that will improve student achievement (Barbieri, 2012). In addition, Youngs (2013) reveals that in 2010, 46 states accepted the Common Core State Standards to improve student achievement through teacher performance. The purpose of this paper is to examine the pros, cons and current status of merit pay in the public schools. The question used in this proposal state as: “What is the relationship between merit pay and teacher performance?” The benefit of this research will hopefully close the gap in merit pay for K-12 teachers and teacher