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This paper will argue against the implementation of public policies which require or encourage individual teacher bonuses based on student test scores. Teacher incentive programs as they are now conceived and implemented in Public Education Policy are unable to produce higher levels of student success. Student achievement is often characterized as job skills learned in comparison to other students worldwide. Success and failure in student achievement should no longer be measured in terms of standardized test scores. Due to outsourcing, an increasing number of jobs in the United States require applicants to acquire advanced degrees. The traditional basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic are no longer sufficient to keep American students competitive with advanced international students. Standardized testing, because it evaluates only basic skills, is not an adequate measure of student success. In order to better account for worldwide competition, measures of student achievement should compare job skills between American and international students in terms of human capital. Programs which link teacher pay to test scores will only stagnate the intellectual development of students. Public policy and education literature argues that incentive-based pay for teachers encourages instructors to focus on test-taking skills and basics without developing the critical and analytical skills of students. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an analysis of the power of political images and policy narratives. I argue that the debate over desegregation policies in Los Angeles, California in the 1970s established two dominant policy images about the purposes of public schools: They are meant to promote both academic achievement and racial equality. Each of these images included several policy narratives to support it. Over the next two decades, these images remained. Eventually, however, one became more dominant over the other. As the district moved away from desegregation, the image of schools as promoters of equality diminished, and the academic achievement image took precedence. This was true for several district policies, including policies that originated as part of the desegregation plan. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]