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Race to Top Consolation Prize: $200M for STEM
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Michele McNeil
Education Week
11/16/2011
The U.S. Department of Education has now spelled out what the nine runner-up finalists from last year's Race to the Top competition must do to get a piece of the $200 million consolation prize.
This new money, which makes for a third round of the Obama administration's signature education-reform initiative, must be spent on programs aimed at improving science, technology, engineering, and math, or the STEM subjects. UPDATE [5:26 P.M.]: States must pick an existing project from their round-two plans. They can pick something that is entirely STEM focused, or a broader area that has a STEM element. For example, a state could decide to pitch a part of its plan dealing with recruiting new teachers, with a special focus on STEM teachers.
For states to qualify, according to the rules the department put out today, they must meet nine requirements or "assurances". For one thing, they must be in compliance with maintenance-of-effort requirements in the Education Jobs Fund, which already means South Carolina (if it had even wanted the money) wouldn't be eligible.
The state also has to be in compliance with certain requirements regarding its data system under the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund, a one-time pot of federal stimulus aid. (Could California be in trouble for this?)
