Merit Pay Case Summary

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Cases on Merit Pay
In Scheelhaase v. Woodbury Cent. Comm. Sch. District (1973), a veteran teacher was dismissed due to low test scores on the basic skills assessment. The educator argued that her due process rights were violated due to the school misusing student scores. Initially, the trail court ruled in favor of the teacher because student ratings should not be the only method used to measure teacher success in the classroom (Pullin, 2013). However, the trail court ruling was reversed by the Eighth Circuit of Appeals determining that state law set the standard by which teachers can be both hired and terminated (Pullin, 2013).
In the case of Kanter v. Community Consolidated School District 65 (1982), a veteran teacher claimed her due process rights were violated when she failed to receive her merit pay increase. In this particular case, the school district did not establish written criteria for the awarding of merit pay funds. The school district also failed to give a written reason for the teacher being denied the merit pay award. According to the courts, merit pay was subjective based on factors judged by the superintendent and the teacher’s peers. In the final ruling of this case, the Court ruled that Kanter has no constitutional right to due process (Ryan, 2008). The decision gave the state the authority to determine
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Louis Teachers Union, Local 420, American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO v. Board of Education of the City of St. Louis (1987), the teachers union sued the school board on the grounds that the evaluation system violated teacher Equal Protection and Due Process rights (Strauss, 2014). The teachers argued that student test scores were not a valid instrument to use to evaluate teacher effectiveness because of the population of pupils who were being tested. Again the courts found in favor of the school board believing the test to be a useful measuring tool because students were tested in the areas that teachers taught (Pullin,