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Paying to Learn: The Effect of Financial Incentives on Elementary School Test Scores

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  • Eric P. Bettinger

Abstract

Policymakers and academics are increasingly interested in applying financial incentives to individuals in education. This paper presents evidence from a pay for performance program taking place in Coshocton, Ohio. Since 2004, Coshocton has provided cash payments to students in grades three through six for successful completion of their standardized testing. Coshocton determined eligibility for the program using randomization, and using this randomization, this paper identifies the effects of the program on students' academic behavior. We find that math scores improved about 0.15 standard deviations but that reading, social science, and science test scores did not improve.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 16333.

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Date of creation: Sep 2010
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:16333

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References

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  1. Ashworth, A. & Hardman, H. & Liu, W.-C. & Maguire, S. & Middleton, S. & Dearden, L. & Emmerson, C. & Frayne, C. & Goodman, A. & Ichimura, H. & Megir, C., 2001. "Education maintenance allowance: the first year: a quantitative evaluation," Open Access publications from University College London http://discovery.ucl.ac.u, University College London.
  2. Kremer, Michael R. & Miguel, Edward & Thornton, Rebecca, 2009. "Incentives to Learn," Scholarly Articles 3716457, Harvard University Department of Economics.
  3. Roland G. Fryer, Jr, 2010. "Financial Incentives and Student Achievement: Evidence from Randomized Trials," NBER Working Papers 15898, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. William T. Harbaugh & Kate Krause, 2001. "Economic Experiments That You Can Perform At Home On Your Children," University of Oregon Economics Department Working Papers 1999-1, University of Oregon Economics Department, revised 19 Mar 1999.
  5. repec:feb:artefa:0038 is not listed on IDEAS
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Cited by:
  1. Borghans, Lex & Meijers, Huub & Weel, Bas ter, 2013. "The importance of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation for measuring IQ," UNU-MERIT Working Paper Series 006, United Nations University, Maastricht Economic and social Research and training centre on Innovation and Technology.
  2. Martin Schlotter & Guido Schwerdt & Ludger Woessmann, 2009. "Econometric Methods for Causal Evaluation of Education Policies and Practices: A Non-Technical Guide," CESifo Working Paper Series 2877, CESifo Group Munich.
  3. Robert Metcalfe & Simon Burgess & Steven Proud, 2011. "Student effort and educational attainment: Using the England football team to identify the education production function," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 11/276, Department of Economics, University of Bristol, UK.
  4. Uschi Backes-Gellner & Yvonne Oswald, 2012. "Learning for a bonus: How financial incentives interact with preferences," Economics of Education Working Paper Series 0079, University of Zurich, Institute for Strategy and Business Economics (ISU).
  5. Joshua Angrist & Philip Oreopoulos & Tyler Williams, 2010. "When Opportunity Knocks, Who Answers? New Evidence on College Achievement Awards," NBER Working Papers 16643, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  6. Roland G. Fryer, 2011. "Teacher Incentives and Student Achievement: Evidence from New York City Public Schools," NBER Working Papers 16850, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  7. Babcock, Philip & Bedard, Kelly & Charness, Gary & Hartman, John & Royer, Heather, 2012. "Letting Down the Team? Social Effects of Team Incentives," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt93n646db, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.

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