Published Date
March 2023
Publication
NBER Working Paper No. 31051
Details
National Bureau of Economic Research
Efforts to attract and retain effective educators in high-poverty public schools have had limited
success. Dallas ISD addressed this challenge with information produced by its evaluation system
to offer large, compensating differentials to highly effective teachers willing to work in its
lowest-achievement schools. The Accelerating Campus Excellence (ACE) program resulted in
immediate and sustained achievement increases. The improvements were dramatic, bringing
average achievement in the previously lowest performing schools close to the district average.
When ACE stipends are largely eliminated, a substantial fraction of highly effective teachers
leaves, and test scores fall. This highlights the central importance of performance-based
incentives.