Community and technical colleges in Washington State could get a financial reward for improving their students’ performance under a new plan approved by the state board that oversees the institutions.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported today that the colleges could earn extra money every time a student passed a remedial examination, racked up a certain number of credits, or earned a degree.

An official with the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges said the panel believed the incentive program was the first in the country. While other states have offered extra funds to reward colleges for graduating students, they have not given institutions additional money for meeting specific benchmarks, Jan Yoshiwara, the board’s director of education services, told the Post-Intelligencer.

The pool of incentive funds, however, isn’t great — just $500,000 to be split, potentially, among 34 institutions. But, over time, the extra cash could add up, as money earned through the incentive plan would be added to each college’s overall appropriation from the state and would become permanent in future years. —Karin Fischer