"Great Teachers and Great Leaders" (GTGL) is one of six research summaries issued by the U.S. Department of Education in support of its Blueprint for Reform. This review examines the presentation of research about improving teacher and administrator quality in GTGL. The review concludes that there are serious flaws in the research summary. The…

Reform advocates and policymakers concerned about the quality and distribution of teachers support proposals of alternative compensation for teachers in hard-to-hire subject areas, hard-to-staff schools, and with special knowledge and skills. The successful implementation of such proposals depends in large part on teacher attitudes. The current…

Our nation is squandering one of its most important resources--our best teachers--and children are paying the price. Current policy initiatives overlook the most obvious, immediate source of improved teaching effectiveness: The great teachers we already have. The top 25 percent of U.S. teachers--more than 800,000 of them--already achieve results…

The Secretary of Education (Secretary) establishes priorities, requirements, definitions, and selection criteria under the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) program. These priorities, requirements, definitions, and selection criteria will be used in two separate and distinct TIF grant competitions: The Main TIF competition, which will provide TIF…

Since 2008 Texas's District Awards for Teacher Excellence (D.A.T.E.) program has provided grants to districts for the implementation of locally designed incentive pay plans. The 2010-11 school year is the third year of the D.A.T.E. incentive pay plans with approximately $197 million in annual state funding. This research brief summarizes the key…

The use of performance-based pay, or merit pay, has become a topic of increased focus in education circles in recent years. Questions about the effectiveness of these types of programs, coupled with a variety of criticisms about the benefits of merit pay, have resulted in teachers viewing this type of incentive structure with much skepticism. In…

Merit pay programs for educators--sometimes referred to a "pay for performance"--attempt to tie a teacher's compensation to his/her performance in the classroom. While the idea of merit pay for classroom teachers has been around for several decades, only now is it starting to be implemented in a growing number of districts around the…

When proposing performance pay for teachers, reformers first must answer three questions: What is the definition of teacher performance? What is the definition of student performance? and What are the goals of schooling? Reformers also need to examine the assumptions that guide their proposals and prepare to deal with the implementation issues…

The Fordham Institute's "Teachers in the Age of Digital Instruction" is an advocacy document outlining a vision for how technology might transform the teaching profession. The report's rationale is based on claims that the current education system lacks the capacity to support the revolutionary changes needed to unleash the technological…

Purpose: Teaching and unit evaluations surveys are used to assess the quality of teaching and the quality of the unit of study. An analysis of teaching and unit evaluation survey practices in Australian universities suggests significant changes. One key change discussed in the paper is the shift from voluntary to mandatory use of surveys with the…

This policy primer is designed to provide base-line information about new forms of teacher pay that are emerging around the country, to support the local conversations and negotiations that will lead to the development of innovative compensation systems. It identifies reasons why teacher compensation is high on local, state, and federal policy…

When negotiating new teacher contracts, most districts, no doubt, are focusing discussions on averting wage freezes and massive layoffs. But prudent districts--those looking for long-term solutions to budget problems as well as those seeking to more fairly compensate the most effective teachers--are reconsidering the traditional salary schedule,…

Even the most cursory look at the current administration's approach to performance pay reveals a noteworthy story. Unlike all of his Democratic predecessors--and some of his Republican ones--President Obama not only appreciates the value of differentiating the compensation of teachers based on a effectiveness, he has put energy and money behind…

In "Performance-Based Pay in the Federal Government"--a paper presented at the February 2008 National Center on Performance Incentives research to policy conference--Steve Nelson discusses the evolution of employee pay systems in the federal government, from the inception of the General Schedule to continuing interest in creating more…

President Obama's education agenda, which unhappily seems to be George W. Bush's program squared, contains two major features that will impact teacher pay and working conditions. The first is that charter schools are to be promoted aggressively. The second is an insistence on teacher merit pay. In this article, the author talks about teacher merit…