ProComp Freqently Asked Questions
Administrators
Here are answers to some of the most frequently asked questions related to Administrators. If you prefer to review the FAQs by another topic, click here.
Q: What is the role of the supervisor in implementing Market Incentives for hard-to-staff positions and hard-to-serve schools?
A: Market Incentives are implemented by verifying a teacher’s role and assignment through the district’s databases and the automated payroll calculator. In a very small number of cases, principals and managers may be contacted to verify the amount of time an educator spends in a hard-to-serve assignment or hard-to-staff school.
Q: What is the principal’s role in implementing Professional Development Units?
A: Educators who are achieving satisfactory professional evaluations may earn Professional Development Units in the manner that best suits their needs. For example, they may enroll in a university class; they may collaborate with colleagues in a focused study; or they may choose to join in a unified program for their school to address a specific need.
Principals and managers become more involved, however, when an educator has an unsatisfactory comprehensive professional evaluation. In this instance, the supervisor works with the educator to identify areas that need improvement and they work collaboratively to develop a Professional Development Unit.
Q: What is the supervisor’s role in approving tuition reimbursement?
A: The educator actually initiates the paperwork to receive tuition reimbursement for courses, conferences or workshops before actually pursuing the work. However, those who joined ProComp in the first opt-in window may have their approval after the fact.
· The key is for the proposed study to apply to the educator’s current or proposed assignment that is covered by the DCTA-DPS labor contract.
· Once the educator has completed the study satisfactorily, he or she submits documentation to the supervisor that indicates successful completion of the professional development activity, such as an official university or college transcript. The educator must also submit receipts for tuition, registration fees for seminars, conferences and workshops and for books required for these activities.
· The supervisor signs the form and the educator sends a copy to Human Resources to keep in the employee’s personnel records. The educator keeps a copy and should also give one to the supervisor.
· Tuition Reimbursement expenses have no impact on a school or facility budget. They come from the funds generated by the ProComp mill levy increase.
Q: What is the supervisor’s role in determining or approving an educator’s “proposed assignment”?
A: The supervisor is only responsible for knowing about the proposed assignment. This acknowledgement is demonstrated when the supervisor signs the form initiated by the employee.
There are only two requirements for proposed assignment:
1.) The position must be covered by the DCTA-DPS labor agreement.
2.) A proposed assignment can be declared only once a year.
· The supervisor signs the form and the educator sends a copy to Human Resources to keep in the employee’s personnel records.
· The educator keeps a copy and should also give one to the supervisor.
Q. How much additional time and work will be required of principals to implement objective-setting and professional development under ProComp?
A. Principals will need to work individually with teachers in Professional Evaluation and Student Growth annual objectives. However, evaluation will remain on an every three-year cycle, except for probationary teachers, as is true in the current compensation system. All other elements will be administered by others. The Professional Development component should be more peer–driven than the responsibility of building administrators, although there may be some additional work for principals.
It is also anticipated that as teachers and principals become more proficient with the system, the workload will level. There is an ongoing effort to involve building administrators in developing systems that will work continuously to support the components so administrator input is considered.
Q. What happens if administrators and teachers cannot agree on how student growth will be measured? Will there be district guidelines to follow?
A. The student growth objectives are created in collaboration between the teacher and the principal. They must reach consensus; neither teacher nor principal can dictate them. The system will include formal dispute resolution processes for teachers and principals when they are unable to reach consensus.
During the life of the DPS/DCTA Pay for Performance Pilot, the partners guaranteed mediation of disputes when forming objectives and binding arbitration of disputes when it was time to decide who received payment. Those formal methods were never needed. The dispute resolution methods for the compensation system will probably be similar to those used in the pilot.
Q. Will principals need to determine which professional development courses teachers get credit for?
A. The Compensation Plan creates a Knowledge and Skills Advisory Committee that will develop Professional Development Links for educators. It will contain representatives of all stakeholders, including principals and teachers. They would approve professional development choices for teachers.
Q. Will principals have professional assistance when stepping through the objective setting process?
A. Yes. Each Area Superintendent has designated an individual or team of persons to assist principals and teachers with objective-setting. They are listed on the web site, www.dpsteacherobjectives.org.