Letters

I was pleased to see your article on the progress of Cincinnati's performance- pay program for teachers ( "Study Tracks Cincinnati's New Teacher Ratings, Test Scores," April 3, 2002). However, I would like to clarify some of the findings from the study you cite, conducted by the Cincinnati public school system's office of research and evaluation.

You say that the study of the Cincinnati schools' Teacher Evaluation System revealed that "students whose state test scores were below average were taught by Cincinnati teachers who earned low evaluation ratings." Actually, our study focused on student-achievement-gain scores and not on absolute test scores. The "gains" we report are a measure of students' academic growth during the school year they were assigned to a teacher. It is important that readers understand that achievement gains made during the school year, and not simple achievement levels, were used to validate the ratings teachers are receiving through the Teacher Evaluation System.

The study did not find that "distinguished ... teachers' students earned above-average state test scores in math, science, and social studies." It did find that students of teachers who received a rating of "distinguished" for the domain of instruction, on average, had higher gains in achievement compared with...