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Teacher Bonuses Boost Reading and Math Skills for Thousands in Tanzania
Through the KiuFunza initiative, supported by the Hempel Foundation, Tanzanian students saw significant learning gains - 22% in reading and 24% in math - demonstrating the impact of teacher incentives on foundational education. More than 78,000 students are benefiting from KiuFunza.
This month, head teachers and subject teachers in 265 primary schools in 11 regions of Tanzania received a total of TZS 401 million in their bank accounts as a performance bonus. The bonus was promised in March 2024 and was conditional on significantly improving the reading and numeracy skills of their early-grade students, as measured independently at the end of the 2024 school year.
The performance bonus is administered through a program called KiuFunza – Kiu ya Kujifunza – a collaboration between the Government of Tanzania and Twaweza East Africa that is supported by the Hempel Foundation. KiuFunza improves foundational reading and numeracy for young students in grades 1, 2 and 3. The vision of the program is to get all children in Tanzania to read and calculate by the age of 10. The 265 schools currently in the program were selected from the poorest performing districts in Tanzania, according to Standard Four National Assessment data.
This year, 1036 subject teachers were paid a total of TZS 334.4 million. Subject teachers received an average of TZS 323,000 (± 128 USD), which is 3.4 percent of the average teacher’s annual salary. The amount received by each teacher is based on the number of students in their class who master basic reading and numeracy skills – including reading stories, addition, and subtraction – as required by the national curriculum. Some 272 head teachers received almost TZS 67 million in total for their supporting role in the performance of the students.
Incentives drive learning gains and teacher engagement
As a result of the KiuFunza incentives, the pass rates in the 265 schools have already started to improve. In November 2024, students in KiuFunza schools showed large learning improvements across all skills assessed in reading and numeracy, compared to a randomly selected control group of primary schools. KiuFunza students did 22% better in reading and 24% better in maths compared to students in control schools. Our evidence shows that these students are more likely to stay in school and sit the Primary School Leaving Examination.
KiuFunza helps teachers feel appreciated for their work and they become more focused on student learning. In classroom observations during surprise visits, duty teachers in KiuFunza schools were 23% more likely to be actively teaching than those in control schools. In other research, students in KiuFunza schools reported that their teachers’ classroom behavior had improved, making students more motivated and providing additional help (compared to student reports from control schools). KiuFunza does not provide teacher training, so its impact is driven by teachers being more motivated to focus on their students’ learning.
KiuFunza is very popular: 95 percent of teachers have a highly favorable view of performance pay based on objective learning measures.
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Learning is at the core of our long-term national development. At the most basic level, all our children should be able to read, count and calculate by the time they are 10 years old. Of course, we need good classrooms and enough desks and books, but we must remember that we also need motivated teachers. KiuFunza proves that a simple teacher incentive system can grow from 100 schools to almost 300 across Tanzania and produce very strong learning effects. KiuFunza is much cheaper than many other education interventions, making it one of the world’s most cost-effective programs to promote basic skills
Aidan Eyakuze, Executive Director of Twaweza
The blog post was produced by Twaweza.
Read the full press release.