Gov. Steve Sisolak and raises for teachers

I’m sure Joyce Cassen’s heart is in the right place in calling on Gov. Steve Sisolak to give promised raises to Clark County School District teachers (Tuesday letter to the editor). If they put him in the governor’s mansion, the governor owes them their spoils. But I would ask for some discretion in the distribution of those funds.

First, give bonuses to teachers whose students excel, reach valedictorian and other top honors. Second, fire teachers whose performance is subpar for three or more years. Meaning, their students rank among the bottom 20 percent in core subjects of math, English and science.

I realize it’s not the custom of the school district or the teachers union to publicly admit there is such a thing as a subpar teacher, but they do exist. This is evidenced by the perpetual poor showing of Nevada students as compared with national standards.

Raises may be well-deserved for some, and there is no better way to raise the performance of all teachers than to reward those who excel and to remove those who fail our students.

Lastly, wouldn’t it be great if we could brag about our teachers receiving financial rewards because their students reached the highest levels of academic achievement, not merely because their union reps scored another Pyrrhic victory against the state of Nevada in the courts?