Dear Mr. Pharazyn, I'm proud of the contract work that the Administration & Board, working with the union, was able to accomplish this year. Have a great time in retirement Jonathan!

sincerely,

Trustee Steven Nelson, (this is his own opinion)

Oh great.. another budget based on best-estimate tax revenues.

And when we don't see 8% increases in tax revenues? Then what? Do we take these raises back?

How about we stick with the conservative estimates and be pleasantly surprised =IF= taxes come in higher than estimated?

How is "Step and Column...based on number of years served in the district and LEVEL OF COLLEGE EDUCATION" not a teacher-stipend for having a master's or doctoral degree, the same as every district in the county?

Ms. Filicetti is a former, multi-term elected school board member. I don't exactly know if her comment intent was suppose to "inform the logic" of the public debate - or question the specific wording of Kevin's article.

The logic of her statement is correct (IMO) and that logic informed my opinion on how to set salary. The phrase "have a master's or doctoral degree" is very specific. A piece of paper, a certificate, a diploma. And "a stipend" is $,$$$ on top of the $$/college units earned through the pay scale (Schedule).

The peer-reviewed and published maco-economics research that I've read, on teacher efficiency and effectiveness (student academic achievement) says there is no statistically significant increase - just because of that "piece of paper" (degree certificate). If the piece of paper is a National Board Certificate / a different process / then the research shows that there is a credible difference in teacher performance (if you care at all about standardized tests).

Public Policy is endlessly fascinating and complex.

micro-economics (sorry)

like American Economic Journal APPLIED ECONOMICS and the NBER pre-publication series etc.

Don't make the same mistake that Palo Alto made where they overestimated property tax revenues and ended up with a shortfall.

This is excellent news for the teachers and the Board should be congratulated for doing a great job.

That being said, the contribution of the district to the CALSTRS retirement system is moving from about 10 percent to a high of 19.6 percent in a few years. I hope that tax revenues make up for this rather steep additional cost.

I believe this puts Mountain View / Whisman on par with Palo Alto leaving Los Altos teachers . . . in the dust!

Check out your school's latest smartest balanced test results and decide if the teacher pay raises are worth it.


Web Link

When tax revenues come below what's needed to fund this increase in pay (and pension payments) will all the people giving the Board high-fives open up their check books and make up the difference?

Salaries should be tied to revenue stream and, of course, performance.
An advanced degree from a questionable institution is worthless without experience that can be evaluated.

Remember the reason why teachers really need to have a raise: their rents have gone up 80% in the past 7 years.

The teachers aren't going to be able to keep the money - it is going to go to the landlords who are jacking up the rents to the stratosphere.

The school district is experiencing 20% turnover each year because of the rents.

If you don't like the idea of having to pay teachers more and more, look to Measure V to slow down the teachers' rent increases to something reasonable.

I agree with "Homeowner who..." I wholly endorse raises for teachers, but in this case a large portion of those raises is needed just to pay dramatically higher rents. We need a good rent control policy here or a major part of these raises, and the taxes we pay to support them, will be going to landlords who are often making windfall profits.

Good point about teachers salaries and rent. Can you imagine how good our schools would be if this was a rent controlled city twenty years ago? Excellent teachers staying with us for decades. Continuity is so important to our community.

Voting Yes on Measure V. For the children!

As long as the cost of housing remains astronomically high, Mountain View will have a difficult time hiring and retaining quality teachers. Thousands of people just applied to be on a waiting list for just 18 BMR (below market rate) apartments currently under construction here in MV. There is simply not enough affordable housing, and the state of California has put brakes on funding. We need rent control! MEASURE V would provide much needed relief to teachers and other members of the community. PLEASE VOTE YES on MEASURE V!