Teacher Performance-Based Incentives and Learning Inequality
This study evaluates the impacts of low-cost, performance-based incentives in Tanzanian secondary schools. Results from a two-phase randomized trial show that incentives for teachers led to modest average improvements in student achievement across...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2020
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/622551599574119009/Teacher-Performance-Based-Incentives-and-Learning-Inequality http://hdl.handle.net/10986/34468 |
| Summary: | This study evaluates the impacts of
low-cost, performance-based incentives in Tanzanian
secondary schools. Results from a two-phase randomized trial
show that incentives for teachers led to modest average
improvements in student achievement across different
subjects. Further, withdrawing incentives did not lead to a
"discouragement effect" (once incentives were
withdrawn, student performance did not fall below
pre-baseline levels). Rather, impacts on learning were
sustained beyond the intervention period. However, these
incentives may have exacerbated learning inequality within
and across schools. Increases in learning were concentrated
among initially better-performing schools and students. At
the same time, learning outcomes may have decreased for
schools and students that were lower performing at baseline.
Finally, the study finds that incentivizing students without
simultaneously incentivizing teachers did not produce
observable learning gains. |
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