How to keep those kids in class? Pay them.

For Michael Grady, a professor of educational studies at St. Louis University, anecdotal evidence is enough to convince him that financial incentives can work. Money will not solve all truancy, of course, but he says a $50 check per week for students with perfect attendance has made a difference at an Illinois charter school. He is a consultant to the school, which is made up of students kicked out of other places. [Editor's note: The original version misidentified the location of the charter school.]

In some cases, though, it has backfired. Dr. Grady says that students have used the money to buy drugs, and some have been beaten by parents - dependent on the cash - for skipping school. But "hard-core kids showed up at school to do some work," he says. "Fifty dollars is a heck of a lot of money for a lot of these kids. It does make a difference in their lives."

Many experts do not see the issue in black or white. Mr. Torres says he would find fault with wealthier communities handing out cash to students for merely showing up. But at the KIPP schools, a charter program in low-income communities across the country, he says a variety of incentives have given students the chance to take field trips to Washington or join after-school clubs.

"I think that is the key," he says, "incentives that can also be tied back to the educational mission."

Garrett Duncan, an associate professor of education at Washington University in St. Louis, says many incentive programs are launched in poor rural and urban communities, and could have unintended consequences. They reinforce "the stereotypes that certain communities do not value education like others; that the value is in the dollar sign," he says.

At Chelsea High School, where attendance levels hover around 90 percent, officials say that making graduation a requirement to collect the money makes it an academic endeavor - even if the money can be used however students wish.

Gerald McCue, executive director for administration and finance for Chelsea Public Schools, says the school needed to overhaul its attendance system, which he says was in some cases punitive and counterproductive: Students failed courses for five or more unexcused absences, and those students with five absences often had no motivation to attend the rest of the course.

But financial incentives can be counterproductive, too, says Richard Ryan, a professor of psychology at the University of Rochester in New York. Aside from unwanted public-health consequences - sick children showing up at school - once a day is missed and a record tainted, the incentive is no longer relevant.

"Kids have been going to school for centuries without needing to be paid for it," Professor Ryan notes.

While some my balk at the idea of paying cash to teenagers - especially when skipping school is technically a punishable offense - Seigal maintains that it is really no different from offering a scholarship to the most diligent students. And unlike the permanence of an attendance record, the program is not inflexible, says Mr. McCue. "If it works and improves attendance, terrific," he says. "If not, we terminate it and come up with something else."

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