Perdue on teacher pay, flexibility and Gorman

Gov. Bev Perdue wants North Carolina to do a better job of paying good teachers, getting rid of bad ones and protecting teacher jobs from budget cuts, she told a group of Observer editorial writers and reporters this morning.

Here's what she had to say:

On teacher pay: Perdue voiced enthusiastic support for converting from a pay scale based on experience and credentials to one based on student achievement and other measures of teacher performance.

"I believe in the 21st century you've got to look at a whole different model," she said. "The way we're paying teachers now doesn't work."

Perdue said the top of the pay scale needs to be much higher than it is now, and districts need a better way to "get rid of low-performing teachers and principals." She didn't offer any specifics when I asked where money might come from to boost top pay levels. Instead, she noted that "there has to be a restart for the whole pay system."

Perdue also said she supports National Board Certification of teachers and thinks it's a mistake to let them leave classrooms for administrative jobs. I didn't get a chance to press for details on whether that translates to protecting the extra pay for certification.

On flexibility: Perdue says she won't yield state control over allocating teachers and assistants because she doesn't want local districts to have the opportunity to cut those jobs to close budget gaps. "Teachers and teacher assistants are really critical to me."

But she said Superintendent Peter Gorman, whom she described as "a great leader," has sold her on the notion that districts need more control over other spending -- for instance, the chance to decide that money for a state-funded administrator should be used for another position.

And she said local districts should get "some calendar flexibility" beyond what the current state law provides. Again, no specifics (large-group interviews aren't ideal for follow-ups).

On Gorman's worst-case budget approach: Perdue said she wishes more superintendents would roll out early projections on how budget cuts could play out, because it alerts the public and cranks up pressure on county commissioners to do right by school spending. "I admire what he's doing. I think the approach is direct with people and they need to know what's at stake."

You can read Perdue's budget plan here. Or try your hand at crafting a better version here. (I've heard there's a version of this in the works for the CMS budget, which would be even more complicated. I'm hoping the folks who are working on it can pull it off.)

And thanks for the questions some of you sent yesterday. We didn't get to touch on all of them, but I've sent some of the rest -- such as overtesting and lunch-subsidy audits -- to her press folks in hopes of getting answers.