On February 17, the Washington Post "The Answer Sheet" blog featured a contribution by FairTest's Lisa Guisbond on linking teachers' pay to their students' test scores, which attracted more reader comments than any other posting to the site in the past several months:
NATIONAL MERIT SCHOLARSHIP CORP. BULLIES SCHOOL COUNSELOR
TO REMOVE STATE-BY-STATE QUALIFYING TEST SCORES FROM WEB;
FAIRTEST RE-POST’S “CENSORED” DATA TO SHOW AWARD’S BIASES.
Independent researchers have found that evaluating and paying teachers for test scores is either damaging or irrelevant to improved learning.* Unfortunately, even evidence of harm does not seem to affect the growing popularity of such schemes. Policymakers, including U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, should stop promoting this failed approach.