A number of states rushed to change their laws regarding issues like teacher evaluations and charter schools in order to be more Race-to-the-Top-friendly for the first round of prizes. Forty states plus D.C. applied for round one; sixteen were invited to make their case to the Department of Education in D.C. Delaware and Tennessee received the two highest scores: 454.6 and 444.2 out of 500 points respectively.
States that didn't win funds this past round can reapply for round two (applications due in June). But there is one change for round two applications: States' fund requests cannot go over budget guidelines the Department of Education set. In round one, many states asked for more than what the department recommended and the two winning states will receive funds above the ceilings the Department outlined. This change for round two, which will have over $3 billion up for grabs, was made "to fund as many strong applications as possible."
A ranking of all round one applicants' scores are available as a PDF list. How did your state do in the evaluations? Check out each state's application, appendix, scores and reviewer comments here.
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