Bad assumptions and submarines

Bob Sutton does a great job laying out the problem with pay for performance policies that are sometimes linked to value-added measures at the classroom level. Pay might provide an incentive to a teacher to work harder or smarter, but there are a large number of things that have an impact on classroom level growth that are outside the teacher's control. If we are going to provide incentives at that level, it is crucial that we also ensure that resources are equally allocated and that we don't implement bad tests that force our teachers to teach to low/poor standards.

Chris