Race to the Top-District grant program requirements and eligibility criteria

Race to the Top-District Rfa Analysis

School Grant Programs

On May 22, 2012, the Secretary of Education made public the U.S. Department of Education's (ED) intention to build upon recent achievements in education through the Race to the Top-State programs (ED, 2012a) by offering an additional $383 million in grant funding to local school districts in 2012 (ED, 2012b). The goal of the Race to the Top District (RTT-D) Competition is to continue advancing bold innovation and educational standards made possible through state Race to the Top grants. This essay examines the requirements and criteria that must be met in order to apply to the RTT-D program.

Funding Requirements

There are four primary goals that the funding is intended to achieve and these are: (1) preparing students to succeed in college and the global workforce by implementing standards and tests, (2) creating data analysis tools to quantify student achievement, (3) implementing a merit-based system for teachers and principals, and (4) focusing these improvements on the nation's poorly performing schools (ED, 2012a). Despite the emphasis on the adoption of standards, the RTT-D program is also designed to encourage "… personalized, student-focused approaches to teaching and learning that will use collaborative, data-based strategies and 21st century tools to deliver instruction and supports tailored to the needs and goals of each student & #8230;" (ED, 2012b, para. 8). Accordingly, only those LEAs that can demonstrate the leadership and vision to implement these goals will be considered eligible to receive funding.

The RTT-D competitive funding deadline for receipt of applications was October 30, 2012 (ED, 2012e). Given the extremely short period for preparing a proposal, the ED has waived the rule-making process for priorities, requirements, definitions, and selection criteria (ED, 2012a). However, there are two absolute priorities that must be met. The first is that an applicant must show how it will implement a personalized learning environment, as mentioned in the previous paragraph. The second absolute priority must be one of four additional priorities, which are: (1) at least 50% of the participating students must be from urban schools that have received funding from prior Race to the Top competitions, (2) at least 50% of participating students must be from rural schools that received funding from prior Race to the Top competitions, (3) at least 50% of the participating students are from urban LEAs that did not receive Race to the Top funding in the past, and (4) at least 50% of the participating students are from rural LEAs that did not receive Race to the Top funding in the past. It should be noted however, that preference will be given to applicants that have proposed strategies to comprehensively address the needs of economically, socially, physically, and/or cognitively disadvantaged students. In addition, the respective states are not required to provide any matching funds (ED, 2012a).

Application Availability

Applications were first made available on August 16, 2012 and can be downloaded from the ED website (ED, 2012a).

Due Dates

The original due date for completed applications was October 30, 2012, but due to the hurricane Sandy, LEAs located in areas that have been declared a disaster area by President Obama have a new deadline of 4:30 PM EST on November 7, 2012 (ED, 2012e). All other LEAs have an extended deadline of 4:30 PM EST on November 2, 2012, because the offices of the Department of Education were closed on October 29 and 30, 2012 due to the hurricane.

Although there was a deadline for a notice of intent to apply, which fell on August 30, 2012, this deadline was optional because of the time constraints placed on applicants (ED, 2012a).

Award Dates

If an applicant's application is accepted for funding, the funds are statutorily required to be disbursed by December 31, 2012.

Information Required

For applications to be considered, both the state and local education authorities who have oversight responsibilities for the LEA or LEA consortium must be given at least 5 business days to comment on the application (ED, 2012f). State and local educational authorities may decline to comment, and in fact the State of California has decided to waive this requirement for RTT-D applications from its school districts (California Department of Education, 2012). In addition, LEA consortiums must designate a lead LEA to apply on behalf of the consortium or formally designate itself as a separate legal entity in order to apply as a group (ED, 2012f). All documents related to the formation of a consortium, including memos and legal agreements should be included with the application, thereby providing evidence of the consortium's legal standing.

Other information essential to a successful application include the planned evaluation systems for teachers, principals, superintendent, and school board evaluations, the planned data system capable of tracking individual teachers and teacher-student matching, and the policies required to meet federal and state privacy protections on the data thus gathered (ED. 2012f). These innovations and reforms must be implemented by the 2014-2015 school year in order to be considered (ED, 2012c).

If successful, grant awards will be disbursed at the end of 2012 and amounts will depend on the size of the participating student population (ED, 2012c). For participating student populations between 2,000 and 5,000 the award will be between $5 and $10 million for the entire four-year period covered by the award (ED, 2012d). The additional categories for funding are student populations of 5,001 to 10,000, 10,001 to 25,000, and over 25,001, which are eligible to receive funding between $10-20, $20-30, and $30-40 million dollars for the four-year period, respectively (ED, 2012c).