Mathematica’s study of the Teacher Incentive Fund, a $600 million federal grant program that supports innovative approaches to reforming teacher pay, including performance bonuses, was featured in the Teacher Beat column of Education Week. Here’s an excerpt from the piece, “Districts Faced Challenges Implementing Federal Performance-Pay Grants,” by Steven Sawchuck:
Districts participating in a federal program that awards performance-based pay didn't always adhere to all of its components—and they seem to have struggled to communicate the program's goals and features to teachers.
On the upside, teachers participating in the program generally said they were happy with the performance measures used to evaluate them, and didn't feel that collaboration in their schools decreased as a result—one of the oft-cited complaints about such programs.
That's the takeaway from an early study of the initiative, conducted on behalf of the U.S. Department of Education by the policy analysis firm Mathematica Policy Research and released earlier this week. It represents districts from the 2010 awards; the data comes from the 2011-2012 school year.
