School Choice Ohio Blog

We know school turnarounds can happen successfully – the question is how broadly and with what incentives. And Arne Duncan aims to find out. Alberto Retana popped into Columbus today from the US Department of Education to educate community and education leaders about the USDOE’s new School Improvement Grants.

School Improvement Grants are available for the nation’s lowest-rated public schools that want to turn things around. (Thankfully, Ohio kids in these schools have the EdChoice Scholarship to turn to in the meantime.)

$152 million in Ohio and $4 billion nationwide are available through these grants for the bottom of 5% of schools that elect to “transform” their school either through one of three general options: staff replacement and operations changes, handing operations over to a charter school, or closing up shop.

69 schools in Ohio are eligible; participating schools will receive $1-2 million per year for three years. Community organizations can be invited by districts to provide “wraparound services” like emotional/social support and after-school tutoring.

Questions that come to mind:

• What will prevent schools from submitting half-hearted ‘cookie cutter’ applications to receive the funding?
• How will schools that receive the grants to turnaround be held accountable for turnaround results?
• How will districts handle the potential $3-6M incentive to close low-rated schools?
• All of the turnaround models include replacing the principal. Does the application process rely on principals to essentially fire themselves?
• Schools can receive money for turnaround efforts that have already begun. How much of the grant funding will supplement old efforts and how much will incentivize new turnarounds?

The USDOE presentation came on the heels of a panel discussion of school turnarounds by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute yesterday.  Look for further discussion in Ohio this spring on school turnaround prospects here in the Buckeye State.

Encouraged? Curious? Skeptical? Find out more about the school turnaround conversation here, here, and here and let us know what you think.

- Sarah Pechan