Mythomania Hug$ & Ki$$e$ Bonu$ Award

Well, there you go. Out of that September 19th Caucus meeting Privileged session comes the announcement of the Board of Mythomania's award of a Performance Bonus for Dr. Richard "Build the Trust" O'Malley for the school year 2011-12. This will be voted on at the September 24, 2012 Action Meeting. Now, this is perhaps one of the silliest things I've seen come out of Mythomania Lane in quite some time - not to mention a foolish waste of taxpayers money.

You can see my take on this Performance Bonus in the June 3, 2012 post - Board of Mythomania's Super Performance Criteria. Briefly, if you're gonna set quantitative and qualitative criteria for a performance bonus, then the criteria can't be vague and ambiguous as it is in the criteria set for Dr. O'Malley. If you do, then you can't have any meaningful evaluation, which is what you get now.

Take for example the NJ ASK Scores. Fifty percent (50%) of his bonus is predicated on increasing %'s scoring in the Advanced Proficient and decreasing %'s scoring in the Partially Proficient. Now, that's nice but with all due respect, what does increase and decrease mean? What's the % needed? What scores are they looking at to evaluate him - total scores, individual school scores or the related sub-group scores? Ditto for what scores they using to compare against. Finally, how are they distinguishing between the normal year to year improvement and O'Malley's contribution to this year's scores?

Point being that with this vague and ambiguous criteria there is no clear and meaningful way you can measure performance and therefore, they can measure it any way they want. So it goes for the other three (3) Board Goals used in O'Malley's Bonus Criteria. Throw in the fact that a simple reading of O'Malley's contract here puts into question whether he's even eligible for a performance bonus in the 2011-12 school year.

But the Performance Bonus Criteria isn't the point of this post. I'll have more to say on this whole matter after they vote on it Monday night.

What you want to be aware of is this bit of duct tape transparency going on over there on Mythomania Lane. Once again, we have an unsigned agenda for the September 29, 2012 Action meeting that fails to disclose O'Malley's Performance Bonus is up for a vote. It's not listed on the Summary on page one (1) of the agenda. Maybe it's me, but something that important you might want to highlight right up front. Be that as it may, you'll have to search through forty-two (42) pages of the agenda to find it listed on page 25.

And here it is:

Now, this is exactly why O'Malley shouldn't be let around any numbers and certainly not be allowed to present anything that has to do with numbers. You see, they're only showing you what criteria they believe has been met and how much they're giving him. What they're failing to show you is how they believe he measured up to all the performance criteria they set up. Shouldn't they be telling us about how they measured him against all the criteria and not just the criteria they gave him money for?

Remember, fifty percent of his bonus is based upon four (4) NJ ASK Scores weighted equally and the other fifty percent (50%) is based upon the other three (3) Board Goals for 2011-12 and are weighted equally.

Here's his Performance Bonus Criteria:

And here's what they did, but failed to show you, to come up with the numbers used in the Action Agenda for September 24, 2012:

As you can see, all the numbers in Red, were not included in their resolution for O'Malley's Performance Bonus.

As I said, this whole thing is a tad bit of a joke but they could of at least put out the results of their review of all these silly performance bonus criteria - and not just selected numbers.

Not that it matters but they made him eligible for the Max 2% of his $210,000 salary for 2011-12 or $4,200 and he earned, according to the Board, $2,625 of that $4,200 or 1.25%.

Anyhoo, here's what the numbers would be if he earned the entire 2%:

And here. what the Board says he actually earned:

Guess he only had half a facilities timeline done!

But hey, what do I know? I still can't figure out if this $2,625 is for Performance - then does that mean the $4,200 raise he already got is for Non-Performance?!?

Board of Mythomania's Super Performance Bonus Criteria

Well, according to the performance bonus agreement between the Board and Super Dr. Richard "Build the Trust" O'Malley, he is eligible for a bonus for the 2011-12 school year. Though his employment contract clearly includes eligibility for performance bonus up to 2%, it's not quite clear whether he is eligible for that performance bonus in 2011-12. Still awaiting clarification of his eligibility in 2011-12 from the school district.

Continuing on, according to this bonus agreement, he is eligible for a maximum bonus of 2% of salary. It is based on the Board of Mythomania's goals set for the 2011-12 school year. Any bonus paid will not become part of regular compensation and Super O'Malley's performance will be reviewed by the Board President and approved by a majority of the board.

Some more particulars - any amount allotted (up to 2% of salary) for a bonus will be based on the achievement of seven (7) board goals. Half of the bonus (50%) is allotted to the improving four (4) results on NJ ASK for third-graders and eight-graders (decreasing %'s scoring at partially proficient and increasing %'s scoring at advanced proficient). Each of the four results is weighted equally at 25%. The other half of the bonus (50%) is allotted to the achievement of three (3) other board goals (establishing a public education fund, setting a facilities plan & timetable and expanding community outreach to residents & businesses) . Each of these 3 goals is weighted equally at 33%.

So, what do we have here? Each of the NJ ASK results are worth 12.5% of the money allotted for a performance bonus and each of the other board goals are worth 16.6% of the money. Guess it's possible that they can fail miserably on the testing results but send out a few surveys to find out what you think about public education in Downtown Edison - and Super O'Malley still gets some of that bonus money!

Seriously now, can these goals be any more general or vague? What does decreasing or increasing testing score %'s mean? Does one-gizillionth of 1% qualify? And what's with those other 3 board goals. I could qualify for those and I don't work there!

Sadly, why does the board pass along all their board goals on to the Super? Clearly, I recognize that the board sets the policies and the Super runs the school district but don't you think that that board should have some goals inherent to their role - like board oversight?

This is one silly set of performance indicators. But hey, what do I know, I still can't figure out the criteria difference between a 2% raise and 2% performance bonus for O'Malley over there on Mythomania Lane.

Anyhoo, there's a file that includes a performance bonus calculator as well as the performance bonus agreement and the board's goals for the 2011-12 school year. Anyone who wants the file, just let me know: