Under President George W. Bush's education plan, all pupils in grades three to eight will be tested annually and federal aid will be tied to improvement in test scores. US Secretary of Education Rod Paige said that these tests will measure every student against standards and schools will be held accountable for the results. Good luck, Mr. Secretary, in trying to hold school administrators accountable for anything.

Despite a decade-long effort by the government to improve reading ability, scores nationwide have declined. In recent international science and math achievement tests, the United States ranked below such economically depressed nations as Bulgaria and Slovakia.

Locally, our teachers are among the highest paid in the nation, yet the performance of our schools is mediocre. Student reading and math scores in Elmont and Malverne are far below Long Island averages. In the West Hempstead school district, fourth grade reading and writing scores are 13 percentage points lower than in the Lynbrook schools.

The average pay of the top 5 percent of classroom teachers in West Hempstead is $88,250 for a 10-month school year plus generous benefits. But the $88,250 is base pay, and some teachers could receive $15,000 or more in extra pay for coaching and club activities which would boost their pay to over $100,000.

A teacher who earns $99,674 a year is paid $2,859 for cafeteria supervision. The teachers union contract has nine pages listing extra pay but none on holding teachers accountable for student learning. That doesn't make sense.

The best teacher in the school is paid the same salary as the worst teacher if they have equal longevity and education credits. That, too, doesn't make sense, but it's a union rule.

George Rand