Policymakers and educators are taking a new look at incentives as they work to improve accountability systems. This ERIC Digest examines the role of rewards and sanctions in school reform and identifies key issues in implementing incentive systems. The new accountability is based on five components: carefully designed standards, assessments…

Developments in several states suggest that a state-imposed accountability system is gradually taking shape. State authorities have established both incentive systems to reward high-performing school districts and systems of sanctions to be applied to districts with a record of repeated low performance. To accomplish this, a majority of states are…

Turning around a low-performing school is a complex process in which cause-effect relationships are difficult to isolate. But recent interest in helping low-performing schools--spurred on by the reforms mandated by the No Child Left Behind Act--has generated some useful research and thoughtful analysis. This digest explores some of the key…