This is bad for the children of Newark and New Jersey.

Disgusting! Where do ESL,tech,music, arts, world Lang, etc. fit onto this equation? Is this because Newark was taken over by the state???

No! These teachers should get a battle pay for dealing with rude, obnoxious children with no home training Or children who are coming to school hungry and abused and are extremely angry. There are so many children with baggage that an education is the last thing on their mind. All you need are one or two but so many classrooms have 6 or or more such students. Their parents are impossible to talk to, the administrators close their door and don't deal with them and the public is oblivious as to what is occurring in urban classrooms. Ask the teachers that work there. Or volunteer for a month and you would want to give the teachers a 20% increase.

I think this is great. Good teachers should get rewarded and i believe this includes ESL, tech, music, arts, etc. (or should). I think my son's current teacher is a rock-star, but his teacher last year, though very sweet, was easily overwhelmed and flustered (with just 10 students and 1 full time aid).
Think back to our (your) own school year experience. I'm sure most of us will agree that there were maybe a hand-full of phenomenal teachers that left a lasting impression, most were average, and some were down right mean.
Last, don't be so quick to pigeon hole urban classrooms....there are rude, obnoxious children with no home training; and parents who are impossible to talk to, in the suburbs too. And their teachers are also worthy of the "battle pay"

I think that every teacher who goes into a classroom and performs the daily required task of teaching, inspiring, motivating and tolerating some of the behaviors of many of the students in every subject area. Teachers have become more than just a teacher
they are the encubator of childrens early lives, second to their parents. I agree with you FIX.

Merit pay has failed everywhere again and again to improve student achievement and teacher performance. It has a solid track record in America of complete failure, not working for any school district. It recently failed in NYC. Believeing in merit pay is like believing in fairies. Yet, conservative politicians and their billionaire friends continue to insist and impose it, and weak labor leaders agree. What does work is simple--professional training for all teachers, intense development while on the job, senior coaching in classrooms for new and weak teachers, decent pay, small classes, freedom for teachers to teach to the ways kids are learning in class instead of teaching to the tests. Bad teachers are out there, they should be supervised for improvement and if not, then fired, period. Good teachers are everywhere, hard-working, not in it for money or fame. Merit pay is the enemy of good teaching.

The problem is this...the merit pay will be based on student test scores. So what happens to the students who are lower functioning ? Will any teacher want them in his/ her class if they will bring down the scores? And why are the tests the arbiter of successful teaching? And yes, what about the arts? And also, don't forget how favoritism among the upper echelons fits into this. Don't like the fact that a teacher fights the system on behalf of a child? Give that teacher all the low achievers year after year. Then you can fire her/ him!

You cheerleaders need a clue.
This is the worst kind of all kinds of BS.
Don't you get it? Are you that naive?
Most of the money will disappear as thoroughly as if it fell into the giant black hole at the center of our galaxy.
Out of whatever is left, nepotism and sycophantic weasels will get most of it.
Then they will throw a few table scraps to a handful of deserving teachers just to make the whole dog and pony show look legit.
The teachers lose, the kids lose, and the parents of the district lose.

Grow up.