Race to the Top Returns, This Time for School Districts
But with signoff from local unions required, some districts have been sidelined.
Twenty-one New Jersey school districts are among more than 370 nationwide to apply for $400 million in federal Race to the Top funds, as the sweeping and sometimes controversial competition goes local with a push into specific instruction models and technology. Due last week, the applications came from a wide range of districts in New Jersey, from Newark and Paterson to three different consortia of suburban districts. Winners will be announced by the end of the year. But part of the story was also about districts that didn’t apply, unable to get their local unions to sign off, as is now required by the grant program. The most notable was the state-run Jersey City schools, the state’s second-largest district and the largest of the New…
