The school district who applies for this grant must meet some of the following requirements:
- Have at least 40% of participating students be from low-income families, based on eligibility for free or reduced-price lunch subsidies.
- Include a "Competitive Preference Priority" and propose to extend reforms beyond the classroom and partner with public or private entities in order to address the social, emotional, and behavioral needs of students.
- At a minimum, design and commit to implement no later than the 2014-15 school year a
1. Teacher evaluation system
2. Principal evaluation system
3. Superintendent evaluation system
Additional requirements include:
"The LEA or consortium will submit a report to the Secretary?"
That sounds an awful lot like the federal government is directing the education of a local school district. We didn't think that was legal even on a State level, let alone, a district level.
Finalists for the grant competition were recently announced. On the list was the Arizona Cartwright School District. The Cartwright District is eligible to win up to $25M. To put this number in perspective, the 2014 budget submitted by the district was $95M.
And who is the district's Governing School Board President?
And fellow board member is Arizona Representative, Lydia Hernandez.
From their district website homepage:
Awards will be announced in December 2013.
Let us be the first to be on record to say that if the Cartwright School District "wins" their $30M taxpayer funded grant, Senator Gallardo and Representative Hernandez will still whine and complain about any State education budget cuts in the spring.
