National Center On Performance Incentives Is Out With…

a report looking at merit pay for teachers in the Nashville School District. The study lasted for three years using middle school teachers in math.

The maximum bonus a teacher could get was 15,000 bucks and over 1 million bucks in bonus money was paid out over the three year period.

They found a bunch of teachers left the program in year 2 for various reasons such as not teaching in the middle school grade level, retiring, etc…

What they found is that merit pay did not work much at all. They did find some gains in year 2 and three for grade five only, but they debunked every reason why that grade level did the best.