Reply #29: easy.

[ulysses]

I taught for three years in an urban middle school that hasn't made adequate yearly progress under NCLB except once since AYP was instituted. What are you going to base my pay on if I'm teaching there? Test scores, most likely. Therefore, I'm going to head for "higher ground", much as I might like to stay and work with the kids who need it most, so that my family doesn't take a hit. The district still needs to staff that school, so they do it with increasing numbers of new teachers, many of whom will get their asses kicked in that environment. Instruction continues to suffer. We call it the "Matthew effect" - the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

There.