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Directions: Suppose that you are an advisor to the Governor of Michigan. The Governor is deciding on her education policy initiatives and wants to propose some education policies. She has put forward three proposals:
1. Reduce class sizes in elementary schools by 20%.
2. Introduce a rule that as part of the tenure decision, schools must consider the average value
the added score for the teacher over his/her career.
3. Implement a teacher incentive pay program that will pay a $1000 bonus to teachers each year
whose evaluations place them in the top 20% of teachers state-wide. Evaluations are
based on a mix of value-added scores, principal evaluations, and teacher attendance.
Choose one of the proposals above and provide a written policy brief of 600 to 1500 words that advises the governor on whether the proposal is a good or bad idea or if the existing research cannot provide a consensus one way or the other. In your brief, you should make sure to discuss the following
1: A brief overview of the state of the particular education policy you choose in Michigan and
nationwide.
2:A discussion of relevant research on class-size, teacher tenure and value-added, or teacher
incentive pay – depending on which policy proposal you choose – and how it the findings relate
to the proposed policy.
3:A recommendation to go forward with the policy, not go forward with it, or suggestions for
chang
In your research discussion, you must draw upon at least four academic sources and make sure to provide a reference list (including references to course readings used in the essay). The reference list does not count towards your word requirement. These sources must be articles from the publications listed at the end of this document. To conduct searches for your sources you should use either Google Scholar (https://scholar.google.com) and/or Econlit (https://search-proquest-com.proxy2.cl.msu.edu/econlit). You may need to provide your MSUNet ID and password for the latter. To retrieve the articles, there is typically a link you can click after searching,
otherwise, you can search for the journal name and then find the article using the volume and issue
number via MSU Library’s electronic journals portal
(https://libguides.lib.msu.edu/eresources/ejournals).
You may also use popular press outlets like newspapers and magazines in your essay and readings from
class not included in the source list (e.g. the textbook) but these will not count towards your four
required references (though you should still include them in your reference list). You may not use any
other writings such as blog postings, Wikipedia, or websites (other than those from news organizations)
