The education system's purpose is to enable every student to have the knowledge and skills to reach their full potential -- which requires students are college and career ready. But for far too many students, the system is falling short. A recent report found 60 percent of high school graduates were not college or career ready. Closing this gap requires bold policy moves, and it requires tapping into one of the greatest incentives proven to move school performance: funding. Most states are locked into a one-size-fits-all funding approach or requires schools to adopt top-down approaches that do not always lead to better outcomes. Rather than strip funding away from underperforming schools, a properly designed performance funding model can create the needed incentive to transform outdated instructional models and reward schools for student gains. By linking a meaningful portion of funding to student learning, states can drive innovation and improvement. A key element is providing significantly larger rewards for success with economically disadvantaged and special education students, so that even districts with concentrations of these students can fully benefit. Depending on a state's specific goals and priorities, there are many different potential outcomes that can be linked with performance funding. In 2019, Texas approved one of the nation's "biggest and boldest" efforts to use performance funding in education. The state began providing significant bonuses for College, Career or Military Readiness (CCMR), with higher rewards for success with economically disadvantaged and special education students. This brief describes how the CCMR bonuses in Texas were developed, how they are designed, and how they are working so far.