Steve Cook, the president of the state's largest teachers union, is also listed as the highest-paid employee of the Lansing School District. His annual salary is $20,000 more than that of the district’s superintendent.

The deal between the Lansing School District and the Michigan Education Association allows Cook to remain a member of the state’s pension system for school employees while working full-time as president of the private union. This lets him accrue pension benefits based on his $201,613 MEA salary, setting Cook up for a much higher post-retirement payout from the underfunded public school employees pension system.

The Lansing School District approved the deal, under which Cook is classified as an “educator on loan” from the district to the union. The district has said it was reimbursed by the union for all of the expenses of the arrangement.

According to the district, Cook works for the MEA and has no job responsibilities with Lansing schools.

The practice raises questions as to why someone serving as a high level executive in a private organization would be allowed to remain in an underfunded government pension system, leveraging his six-figure salary to garner a much higher pension payout.

A public school employee’s pension formula is based upon years on the payroll and the final three or five years of compensation, depending upon the plan. If the district is allowing Cook to substitute his $201,613 MEA salary for pension calculations – which the pension fund contributions it makes on his behalf suggest – this would greatly increase Cook’s annual pension payout. Cook spent 15 years in the Lansing School District as a paraprofessional.

In 2014, the Lansing School District contributed $51,976 on Cook’s behalf to the public school employee retirement plan, called Michigan Public School Employees Retirement System (MPSERS). In 2013, the average salary for a Lansing School District teacher was $64,814. The annual contribution to MPSERS by the district for a teacher of that salary would be $16,709.

The arrangement by which the district makes pension contributions based on Cook's six-figure MEA salary has been in place for at least four years.

The Lansing School District answered some basic questions about Cook’s arrangement with the district but refused to answer more detailed follow-up questions.

Robert Kolt, a spokesman for the district, said it had “already responded to your questions.” He added, “There is no reason for you to continue to ask the same questions again and again; you have answers. There is no need for you to email again.”

Yvonne Caamal Canul, district superintendent, was asked to explain the responsibilities that Cook has as an “educator on loan.”

“Mr. Cook’s responsibilities are determined by the organization to which he is being loaned,” Canul said in an email.

But the responses and refusals leave many questions unanswered. Cook was employed by the district as a “paraprofessional” (classroom assistant) for 15 years. He served as the president of the Lansing assistants union from 1981 to 1993. Cook became the secretary-treasurer of the MEA in 1991.

It is unclear how long Cook has been an “educator on loan” with the school district. It’s also unclear how the school district handled Cook’s involvement with the MEA.

The Michigan Education Association has not responded to emails or a phone message asking for comment on Cook’s arrangement.

Also unclear is whether any other public school district has ever “loaned” an employee to a private entity, as happened in this instance.

Bill DiSessa, spokesman for the Michigan Department of Education, said they use an “educator on loan” occasionally.

“Typically, we borrow an educator with the expertise we want for a special project. That educator remains employed at his or her district and retains their longevity and seniority. We reimburse the district for their costs. When the project is done, the educator returns to their district,” DiSessa said in an email.

“We use this process occasionally. Local districts and ISD also make use of this process, though we keep no data on it. It can be a win-win. For instance, if District A loses a teacher to maternity leave and District B has an under-used teacher, that teacher can help out temporarily in District A until its teacher returns from leave. This is just one example,” DiSessa said.

For most people who follow government, nothing is more meaningful or more dramatic than the struggle to pass a law. In this romanticized view, the passage of a law means that change was required, and that those who break the new law will be punished.

In 2011, the Michigan Legislature passed a series of education reforms, designed to retain and reward Michigan’s best teachers. According to these new laws, districts would have to pay high-achieving teachers a premium, and could not make teacher hiring and firing decisions on the basis of seniority alone. For those who celebrate new laws, this marked the beginning of change.

But Michigan’s public education system did not change dramatically simply because a few laws had been passed. As the Mackinac Center found in a 2012 survey of collective bargaining agreements, some districts “complied” by paying their best teachers just $1 more, with the majority of districts ignoring the law entirely.

In the spring of 2014, we conducted another survey, finding that 60 percent of surveyed districts worked to preserve collective bargaining language that was prohibited by the 2011 laws. In comparison, a different 2011 law passed to contain district health insurance costs had widespread compliance. The key difference between the two laws, we noted, was that the one addressing health insurance costs had a hefty financial fine for districts that failed to comply.

It is clear that though the passage of a law may be meaningful for some, many school officials appear not to care — unless a financial penalty or reward is attached. As we suggested in our 2014 survey, if legislators wanted districts to pay their best teachers more and to stop making critical personnel decisions on the basis of seniority, they needed to use a financial stick or carrot.

In response to our recommendations, the Michigan Legislature added a carrot. In order to access an additional $70 million in state funding, school districts must comply with certain “best practices,” including offering merit pay for teachers and removing certain language, prohibited by law, from collective bargaining agreements.

Though adding a financial incentive to an existing law seems like a small change, the Michigan Education Association was livid that school districts would “get more money” if they paid high-quality teachers more and removed some subjects from teacher contracts. The MEA likely realizes what we have learned: The financial incentive attached to a law is at least as important as the law itself.