The 12 winners of the federal Race to the Top competition have experienced near-universal challenges in turning their sweeping, multifaceted proposals into reality, among them a limited state capacity to execute fast, dramatic change and deeply rooted teacher-evaluation systems that have proved hard to transform. Reports unveiled by the U.S.…

This report describes briefly the experimental design and presents the basic contract provisions. The experiment results reveal that performance contracting is no more successful than traditional classroom methods in improving the reading and mathematics skills of poor children. Both control and experimental groups performed equally poorly in…

This report explores the evolutionary process of the concepts of accountability and performance contracting from their inception through mid 1970-71. Six major topics are discussed: (1) ideological, managerial, and pedagogical underpinnings, (2) definitions and history of the concepts, (3) five performance contracting projects, (4) the political…

The General Accounting Office (GAO) evaluated the Office of Economic Opportunity's (OEO) performance contracting experiment because of its potential impact in education. Performance contracting has been defined as an agreement between a local education agency, such as a public school, and a private educational firm, known as a learning system…

This book examines in detail the experiment in educational performance contracting conducted by the United States Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) during the 1970-71 school year. Major objectives of the OEO project were to find out whether a private educational firm could teach educationally disadvantaged children to read and write better than…

One of the originators of performance contracting explains how school districts can use that concept to attack difficult educational problems and meet the increasing demand that schools be held accountable for their educational product. The author argues that what he calls "educational engineering" will guarantee a basic level of achievement in…

This report, the result of five NSBA workshops on performance contracting, provides guidelines to assist school boards in meeting public demands for accountability. Part I explains the broad concept of accountability, describes the mechanics of a performance contract, and outlines a model approach for "turnkeying" a successfully…

This report describes the experimental design, presents the contract provisions, and provides conclusions and recommendations. The document is comprised of five chapters that discuss (1) the statistical analysis methods used, (2) the problems of using standardized tests in performance contracting, (3) the contractual procedures between OEO and the…

After discussing the controversies surrounding attempts at "external" performance contracting--agreements negotiated between local educational authorities and private educational firms--this document describes five "local" programs--agreements negotiated between a local educational authority and its own teachers--involving nine school districts.…