New York Schools Chancellor Joel Klein is set to announce a new plan for value-added technology to be used in the city's schools.

In an interview on Monday, Klein stated that the program would be piloted next year and hopefully, formally adopted in fall of 2006. This could be a first baby step toward merit pay reform in the Big Apple.

Even Randi Weingarten was hesitantly optimistic, though one wonders about the implications of this statement: "My concern is that a concept that is this complicated and this sophisticated and this potentially interesting will be dead on arrival," she said. "It will be viewed as a weapon against teachers in schools."