Parents and professionals that I know are asking me questions about "Race to the Top" and what or how will it impact our schools and our kids.... This came to me in a news message today. I would like to share it with you so that you can do your research and make an informed decision on your position on this very important topic!

Follow up:

As you may know, the U.S. Department of Education is releasing its proposed guidelines today covering the $4.35 billion in “Race to the Top” grants. Although it’s a relative “drop in the bucket” in terms of the larger $100 billion education federal stimulus plan, Race to the Top is a key Obama administration effort to convince states to make specific policy moves. We have received a lot of questions from our partners in the past few weeks about Race to the Top, so I wanted to make you aware of some resources that can help you understand this breaking news. I’ve included links to two edweek.org stories below. The first is a great summary of the proposed guidelines from the Dept. written by Education Week’s Michele McNeil. The second is a commentary on the program from Joanne Weiss, the Department of Education’s Race to the Top director, that appears on www.edweek.org.
‘Race to Top’ Guidelines Stress Use of Test Data http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2009/07/23/37race.h28.html?tkn=UPRFUwUf4dDygH8Yt4n7mb1VaVZXDQ9nRh31 Special Commentary on Race to the Top from Joanne Weiss, U.S. Dept. of Education’s Race to the Top Director http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2009/07/24/37weiss.h28.html Of course, we’d encourage you to return to edweek.org for more details on this important program. I hope this information proves useful to you.

Thank you for your time.
Sean Herdman
Associate Publisher, Sales & Marketing
Editorial Projects in Education

Editorial Projects in Education is the publisher of Education Week, edweek.org, Digital Directions, Teacher Professional Development Sourcebook, Education Week Leadership Forums and TopSchoolJobs.org.