What Were State Ed Officials Thinking in Race to Top App?

Follow instructions, write clearly, pay attention to organization. It’s all advice teachers in California commonly give public school students.

But a close reading of the state’s failed application for millions of dollars in Race to the Top stimulus funds – the biggest bonanza of federal education dollars in decades– shows that California officials failed to adhere to any of it.

“One thing that does seem a clear distinction (with the winners) is the specificity with which many of the states went into in their applications…” Rick Miller, deputy superintendent of California’s Department of Educators, told local districts and other stakeholders in a March 8 conference call.

The finalists “had a very clear idea of exactly what they wanted to do and how they wanted to do it,” he said.

Miller and Kathryn Radtkey-Gaither, undersecretary for education, urged those on the call to read California’s application. Let them know, Radtkey-Gaither said, if there are any “Oh-my-gosh-what-were-they-thinking-moments.”

Understanding how the state fell short, both said, will help as California prepares its application, due June 1, for Phase 2 Race to the Top funding.

Because a majority of San Francisco’s low-performing schools are in the Mission District and funding here is crucial, Mission Loc@l read the state’s failed application, reviewed those of some of the winners and spoke to Miller about some oh-my-gosh-moments.

First, the background.

It was only last November that Washington announced the Race to the Top rules, but by the January deadline 40 states and the District of Columbia submitted applications.

Reviewers read and scored each for a total of 500 potential points. Four days before Miller’s call to stakeholders, Washington had announced 16 finalists. California was not on the list.

It was unclear by how many points California trailed the finalists, but Radtkey-Gaither said the state “lost at least 100 points.”

Still, there’s an opportunity to do better, state officials said.

At the same time the Phase 1 winners are announced in April, the scores and reviewers’ comments will be made public for states to use in preparing their June 1 applications. Washington has said that at least half of the $4.35 billion in Race to the Top Funds will be saved for the second round.

Until April, no one will know for sure where reviewers found California’s application wanting. But other news emerged about the finalists.

Fourteen of the 16 winners, Education Week reported, got technical assistance grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

California never applied for a Gates grant, Miller said Wednesday, because one criterion was that states have policies that offer tenure in three years rather than two.

Nonetheless, California had plenty of help. The core team of eight staffers that drafted the application drew on the governor’s staff, education department, state board, and consultants from West Ed and the American Institute of Research, according to Miller.

It proved too many.

Oh-My-Gosh-Moment #1

Form

The application guidelines suggested a basic A to F outline that allowed applicants to earn points in increments. Take, for example, Section D, “Great Teachers and Great Leaders,” for 128-points. The feds broke this down into nine subsections worth anywhere from 5 to 28 points.

New York and Florida, two finalists similar to California in the size of their public school systems, addressed each subsection in order, using the federal description, the possible points to be earned, and making their cases. Then, they moved on to the next subsection.

California too used the basic A to F section heads, but then departed from form by combining subsections, a move that made scoring – very clearly delineated in titled subsections – difficult.

“We noticed that as well,” Miller said Wednesday about the difference. “Our theory was that it was going to be more sort of readable and understandable. We did notice that we were different than the other states and it’s maybe something we correct.”

Both Florida and New York also helped reviewers by using a repetitive structure of bold headings throughout each subsection.

New York used a framework of Goals, Activities, Timeline and Responsible Parties.

Florida’s included Key Highlights, Responsible Parties, A Timeline Chart, and Outcomes.

California’s application generally, but not always, opened with Our Foundation, followed by Goals and Strategies. But too often, it bounced around among subsections. The effect was confusion as to what was being addressed.

“I think that we were trying to tell a story, a narrative,” Miller said by way of explaining why California had failed to devise its own internal framework for subsections. “But I think we are seeing what seemed to work for the reviewers and we will adjust.”

Oh-My-Gosh-Moment #2

Content

New York and Florida offered concise arguments, buttressed with charts to match. Although at 136 pages, California’s application was much shorter than the others (it could have been the size of the font used by other states) it often reads like a disorganized argument that’s poorly backed up.

Take, for example, the section, “Improving teacher and principal effectiveness based on performance.”

New York states its plea early: “Our teacher and principal effectiveness reforms begin with new and more rigorous professional standards for teachers and principals.” The authors quickly lay out a plan to develop standards, using the new funds.

California also begins clearly with the state recognizing “the need to restructure and re-orient its systems for teacher and principal evaluations…” The section then devolves into an internal debate with itself.

On the one hand, “state law already requires the use of student achievement data in evaluation,” to support teacher and leader evaluation, a law clarified by recent legislation, the authors assert.

On the other hand, the next paragraph cites a 2007 study finding “weaknesses in California’s typical teacher evaluation process,” with officials “skeptical of the quality of the data that are collected through classroom observations typically used in performance reviews…”

Miller defended the internal contradictions. Even if the laws have never worked, he said, reviewers needed to know that the state has “the statutory framework to accomplish goals.”

He agreed the finalists offered more specifics throughout their applications. He pointed, for example, to the section on teacher evaluation systems. Finalists included various percentages of a teacher’s evaluation that would be tied to a student’s progress.

California mentioned no firm number. Instead, despite discrediting its efforts to date in an earlier section, the state promised to develop “voluntary state models for evaluating teachers and principals” and encourage local districts to develop their own models.

The lack of details makes California appear reluctant to commit to anything. Miller said the vagueness was, in part, intentional. The state needed time to work out the details in collaboration with hundreds of stakeholders.

Those on the March 8 conference call were warned, however, that the timeline for collaboration would have to be moved forward to develop details for sections the authors now suspect fell short. They named three: the section on teachers and leaders, low-performing schools and the states success factors.

In the next round, Miller said, California must “be a little more clear in how as a state we intend to move forward.”

Miller, however, will not be along for that ride. He said Wednesday he’s moving on to create a new consulting firm, New California Education Partners.