Vi-Nhuan Le

Team Pay for Performance Experimental Evidence From the Round Rock Pilot Project on Team Incentives

Education policymakers have shown increased interest in incentive programs for teachers based on the outcomes of their students. This article examines a program in which bonuses were awarded to teams of middle school teachers based on their collective contribution to student test score gains. The study employs a randomized controlled trial to examine effects of the bonus program over the course of an academic year, with the experiment repeated a second year, and finds no significant effects on the achievement of students or the attitudes and practices of teachers. The lack of effects of team-level pay for performance in this study is consistent with other recent experiments studying the short-term effects of bonus awards for individual performance or whole-school performance.

Using Structured Classroom Vignettes to Measure Instructional Practices in Mathematics

Large-scale educational studies frequently require accurate descriptions of classroom practices to judge implementation and impact. However, it can be difficult to obtain these descriptions in a timely, efficient manner. To address this problem, the authors developed a vignette-based measure of one aspect of mathematics instructional practice, reform-oriented instruction. Teachers read contextualized descriptions of teaching practices that varied in terms of reform-oriented instruction, and rated the degree to which the options corresponded to their own likely behaviors. Responses from 80 fourth-grade teachers yielded fairly consistent responses across two parallel vignettes and moderate correlations with other scales of reform-oriented instruction derived from classroom observations, surveys, and logs. The results suggested that the vignettes measure important aspects of reform-oriented instruction that are not captured by other measurement methods. Based on this work, it appears that vignettes can be a useful tool for research on instructional practice, but cognitive interviews with participating teachers provided insight into possible improvements to the items.

A Longitudinal Investigation of the Relationship between Teachers’ Self-Reports of Reform-Oriented Instruction and Mathematics and Science Achievement:

In the past two decades, several major initiatives were launched to improve mathematics and science education. One prominent feature in these efforts was a new approach to teaching mathematics and science, referred to as reform-oriented teaching. Although past studies suggest this approach may improve student achievement, the relationships between reform-oriented pedagogy and achievement were weak. The weak relationships may be partially attributable to the limited time frame in which reform-oriented teaching was examined (typically a 1-year period). This study explored the relationship between mathematics and science achievement and reform-oriented teaching over a 3-year period. Results suggested greater exposure to reform-oriented instruction was generally not significantly associated with higher student achievement but the effects became stronger with prolonged exposure to reform-oriented practices. Reform-oriented instruction showed stronger, positive relationships with open-ended measures than with multiple-choice tests in both mathematics and science and with problem-solving skills than with procedural skills in mathematics.