As college application season has kicked off, requesting letters of recommendation becomes increasingly crucial. Currently, teachers are not obligated to write rec letters and are not getting paid for the letters they do write, and this should remain the case.
Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD) began at the end of May of 2023 offering teachers extra pay or extra time off to those who write these letters, according to berkeleyside.com. The question thus arises: should this policy be utilized at MHS?
A problem that comes with paying teachers for letters of rec is ethics. Teachers motivated by financial gain might accept more recommendation requests, which will not benefit them or the students as the teachers possibly would not spend as much time on each student’s letter. With less time on each student’s letter, their letters may become generic and may not truly represent the student. With the motivation of money, teachers may write letters for everyone, even if those students did not perform well in the class.
Typically, teachers write letters of rec for students who they believe have promise and have demonstrated college-necessary qualities such as work ethic and good character in their class.
While some may say that a teacher writing letters of rec is similar to a worker doing overtime and thus deserve to be paid, I think that this is the wrong analogy to make. In this scenario, both teachers and the workers are doing work outside of their hours. However, there are cases in which teachers are doing “work” but are not getting paid. Teachers often help guide students outside of the school day such as through office hours or simply being available to students. In this case, the teacher is providing their services, similar to if they were to write a letter of rec, and are not getting paid. Teachers allocate more time to students than they have to because they care, which is what makes the relationship between a student and teacher so special.
If teachers were paid, there would also come the problem of how much they should be paid for writing letters. If there was a flat amount per letter, teachers would be more inclined to write more letters. If there is an amount per hour writing a letter, this could lead to teachers dragging out the time it takes to write a letter in order to be paid more for their service.
The other side to BUSD’s decision is teachers being granted time off for writing letters of recommendation. However, this seems counterproductive as this will make it so teachers are away from their classes, reducing the amount of learning opportunities for students.
Teachers allocate more time to students than they have to because they care, which is what makes the relationship between a student and teacher so special. However, by introducing the prospect of financial gain, a wrench could be thrown into the process and possibly make teachers write letters for the wrong reasons.