A is for iPod ... or pizza ... or cash: is offering rewards for good grades or perfect attendance a good way to boost performance, or a gimmick that sends the wrong message?

• Author: Guernsey, Lisa
• Position: EDUCATION

Would you study harder and do better on a test if you knew there was a new iPod or $50 waiting for you if you did? That's the question at the center of a debate over offering students rewards for doing well in school.

Psychologists have long warned that such programs don't help students do better, and they may even lead to cheating. But economists believe offering rewards might be a valuable incentive, especially for struggling students.

Whichever side is right, programs that pay students or reward them with prizes like iPods are proliferating, especially in high-poverty areas. And now, efforts are under way to study these programs scientifically so educators can figure out if they work and how well. In some places, students can bring home hundreds of dollars for, say, taking an Advanced Placement course and doing well on the exam.

In New York City and Dallas, high school students are paid for doing well on A.P. tests. Another experiment was started last fall in 14 public schools in Washington, D.C., that are distributing checks for good grades, attendance, and behavior. A New Jersey school district offers rewards including free pizza for good grades and model behavior.

Chicago started a privately funded pilot program last fall offering cash for good grades to as many as 5,000 ninth-graders at 20 high schools. Students can earn $50 for an A, $35 for a B, and even a C brings $20. That means a straight-A student could earn up to $4,000 by the end of sophomore year, with students getting half the money immediately, and the other half when they graduate.

"The majority of our students don't come from families with a lot of economic wealth," Arne Duncan, Chicago's school superintendent, told the Chicago Tribune last fall.

Duncan, who is now the U.S. Secretary of Education, said, "I'm always trying to level the playing field. This is the kind of incentive that middle-class families have had for decades."

Other student reward programs are about stuff more than money. At 80 tutoring centers in eight states run by Score! Educational Centers, a national for-profit company, students are encouraged to rack up points for good work and redeem them for prizes like jump ropes, yoga mats, or chess sets.

Last year, Riverside High School in Durham, N.C., began awarding iPods to sophomores who earned top scores on a statewide writing test. Monroe Wolf, now 16, was one of four students who earned the prize.

"It was a nice bonus," Wolf says. "But I was going to...