Leaders in a handful of school districts are pondering the idea of "front-loading" teacher compensation by paying novices more than they would typically earn under traditional salary schedules. Boosting new teachers' salaries, officials in Denver, the District of Columbia, and New York City contend, would increase the applicant pool and…

As states' information-collection systems grow more sophisticated, officials are grappling with where to draw the line on how "value added" data on teachers can be used. Since the adoption of the federal No Child Left Behind Act, the task of establishing data systems for tracking students' year-to-year achievement gains has fallen…