Charles Clotfelter, Elizabeth Glennie, Helen Ladd, and Jacob Vigdor have published an important study of North Carolina’s defunct incentive program for math, science, and special education teachers. According to the study, the three-year program (2001-2004), which paid teachers $1,800 to work in low-income and low-performing schools, reduced turnover rates by 12 percent.
The turnover rate may have been reduced even more, but there was much confusion between the state and participating teachers. Perhaps as many as 25 percent of participating teachers may not have been eligible to receive the bonus in the first place, and a vast majority of the teachers misunderstood the provisions of the program. I think there is a great follow-up study here.
The publication of this study is timely because the House budget did not include the Senate’s $515,115 pilot program that would have paid a cohort of math and science teachers a bonus for teaching in low-performing schools. Clotfelter et al show that targeted incentive pay can work, and can work even better when program administrators are not inept.
Thumbs up: Joe Coletti (Good eye.)
Thumbs down: Michael Moore (UVA? A second rate university.)
