To help states retain teachers and recruit the next generation into the profession, this brief examines teacher compensation policies in states and how adjustments could help reverse teacher shortage trends. The report looks at teacher compensation packages as a whole, including data on salary, health insurance, retirement and other benefits. It…

In the 1980s, school districts dabbled with programs that offered teachers cash inducements, such as bonuses or raises, for doing their jobs well. But those merit-pay programs were mostly short-lived, hotly debated, and understudied. Even after all this time, no one knows definitively whether children learn more when teachers are paid extra for…