Feds also announce $200 million consolation prize to RTT finalists
The feds are busy today.
From US DOE:
The U.S. Department of Education announced that nine finalist states that did not win grants in the first two rounds of Race to the Top will be eligible to compete for $200 million in additional funds this year. Applications will be available in the early fall.
The nine states, Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and South Carolina, can seek grants ranging from $10 million to $50 million, depending on state size and the final number of grants. Given that these grants are smaller than the ones originally applied for, states will work with the U.S. Department of Education to update their RTT plans to reflect a more limited scope of work.
“Every state that applied for Race to the Top funds now has a blueprint for raising educational quality across America,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. “These funds will encourage states to continue their courageous work to challenge the status quo and build on the momentum for education reform happening in our classrooms, schools and communities.”
The Department chose to make the $200 million available in a competition among Race to the Top finalists in order to support states that have demonstrated capacity and commitment around bold reform plans that address the Obama Administration’s four core reforms: raising academic standards, building cradle to career data systems, investing in great teachers and leaders, and turning around persistently low-performing schools.
Race to the Top applications were scored on a 500-point scale across a broad set of criteria. While the 12 original winners of RTT scored 440 or above all of the finalists scored above 412. The non-finalists scored more than 20 points lower.
In phase 2, we had many more competitive applications than we had funds to award,” said Duncan. “We’re committed to working with the states that are the most serious about education reform.”
In the fiscal year 2011 appropriations bill passed in April, Congress provided the U.S. Department of Education with $700 million for the Race to the Top initiative, including an authorization to fund an early learning competition within Race to the Top. $500 million of these funds will support the new Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge, announced by Secretary Duncan and U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius earlier today.
In his remarks today, Duncan thanked Congress for supporting Race to the Top saying, “We are deeply grateful to Congress for supporting these programs. Congress understands the value of investing in education reform, particularly early learning, even in these economic times.”The Obama Administration has also proposed to continue Race to the Top in fiscal year 2012 and is seeking authority to develop a district-level competition.
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11 comments Add your comment
bob leblah
May 25th, 2011
12:00 pm
This is a stupid program. This program yells “Teachers are the problem”, let’s fix them. Some teachers are some of the problem, but not anywhere near the real problem. How about “Race to raise your child properly”.
bob leblah
May 25th, 2011
12:01 pm
This program also supports the idea that if you work harder and throw money at it, it will improve. Wasteful, wasteful, wasteful. Sorry Maureen, I’m glad you brought up.
Good Morning
May 25th, 2011
12:05 pm
Love it Bob! Where is the source of this cash? Is this putting our nation further in debt?
Dr NO
May 25th, 2011
12:17 pm
Arne Duncan is a horses rear-end.
Teacher Reader
May 25th, 2011
12:49 pm
More money wasted by our Department of Education. RTT is one reason this government department needs to go. Spending more money on education is not going to improve anything, it will just make more companies that supply schools programs that often have little or insufficient programs richer. The problem lies with parents, teachers, administrators at all levels, and board of educations. Parents need to parent their children. Schools need to hold children to high standards, except no excuses and hold children back when they do not meet the standards. Stop the excessive testing and use the standards as the basic education, not the end all be all.
Inman Park
May 25th, 2011
3:04 pm
Gee, where’d that money come from? Oh yeah, people in the local school districts sent it to Washington to be “washed” so it could be sent back in the way of a “bounty” for us too foolish to know what to do with it in the first place (Minus a hefty fee, of course. After all, bureaucrats must be paid.) Thanks, Feds.
Education grants made available for nine states – Reuters » The One World Focus
May 25th, 2011
3:14 pm
[...] fundingDenver PostColorado has shot at education fundsBizjournals.comNOLA.com -NJ TODAY -Atlanta Journal Constitution (blog)all 31 news [...]
Mikey D
May 25th, 2011
6:36 pm
“Every state that applied for Race to the Top funds now has a blueprint for raising educational quality across America,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. “These funds will encourage states to continue their courageous work to challenge the status quo and build on the momentum for education reform happening in our classrooms, schools and communities.”….
What a complete and absolute load of bunk. There is absolutely NOTHING about race-to-the-bottom that has spurred any sort of meaningful reform. All it’s done is send an infusion of cash to the testing companies and set education back a decade (at least!)
A Conservative Voice
May 26th, 2011
10:03 am
The one thing that would help education the most in our state is to rid our state of the regulations that come with federal money (this is actually money that came from our state, sent to DC, manipulated and then sent back with strings attached). Accepting this money is doing us no good whatsoever.
Paddy O
May 26th, 2011
10:49 am
ever heard the complaint that a solution to a vexing, entrenched problem was “throwing money at the problem”? (Usually lodged against liberally oriented government officials). This is the epitomy, along with the larger dough in “race to the top” of that solution paradigm. A gigantic waste of $$. You can not fix stupid. I seriously doubt you can “teach” a moron constructive thinking – I believe it is a intrinsic ability. This entire effort is akin to to a Walker Hound barking up the wrong tree.
Paddy O
May 26th, 2011
10:59 am
Conserv – I concur. The feds have convinced themselves, with their copious amounts of Ivy League educated employees, that they have considered the problems of your local community more, and in a far better manner, than those who actually live there. Thus, the solutions they have dreamed up, but not tested in much of a manner anywhere, must be imposed upon those small communities who have NO ivy league educated citizens – regardless of whether those citizens living there desire, wish or even reject these solutions. It is federal arrogance, coupled with mafia protection $$$ we are required to pay, just so we can beg for the scraps to do projects – which, if the federal tax burden was not so onerous, we may have been able to do without federal generosity and oversight, on our own – but we can not, because the feds are sucking up all the tax resources and transferring them overseas and into the wealthy federal government class’ greedy hands.