Race to Top winners chosen jordan 13 bred arbitrarily

Tennessee and Delaware, the first two states to win education funding through President Obama's $4 billion Race To the Top competition, were chosen through "arbitrary criteria" rather than through a scientific process, according to a new report by a non partisan research institute.

In the first round Education Secretary bred 13s Arne Duncan chose two winners from 16 finalists. Delaware won $100 million, or about $800 per student, and Tennessee was awarded $500 million, or about $500 per student. The second round is now underway and Duncan has said he expects more states to win.

The applications presented by the two states won the most points Delaware, 454.6 and Tennessee 444.2 that were awarded by a panel for the level of compliance with school reform policies favored by Duncan and President Obama.

Those reforms include expanding the number of charter schools and linking teacher evaluation to student performance and standardized test scores.

The Education Department said the winners were selected on the precise numbers and were objective. The report says otherwise.

The 500 point system has six major categories, seven general categories, and various subcategories. By assigning numbers to each one, "the Department implies it has a testable theory or empirical data to back up its quantitative method."

But it doesn't have either, and, therefore, assigned the numbers subjectively.

"Further examination suggests that the selection of Delaware and Tennessee was subjective and arbitrary, more a matter of bias or chance than a result of these states' superior compliance with reform policies," it said.

And, it said: "The necessary subjective judgments required both for category selection and weight assignment makes a fair competition practically impossible, even if the competition is undertaken with great care."

The report even questions whether Duncan and his team chose the indicators for the competition carefully enough.

"RTT awards 10 points for "developing and implementing common, high quality assessments," referring to assessments that are aligned with the common standards in reading and math being developed by the National Governors Association (NGA), Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), and a number of states. The Blueprint, however, also proposes competitive grants to develop 'high quality assessments in .

What is unfortunate is that a lot of states spent a lot of money putting together applications, only to come away with nothing, and now they are being forced to do it all again for another chance at potentially nothing, and definitely less than they'd been promised before. Eventually, states will realize that money from the federal government is a double edged sword that often bred 13s for sale weakens state education as much or more than it reinforces state efforts. We'd probably all be better off if the federal government just stopped taxing everyone by however much they are giving to schools, let the states take over and tax for the difference, and then spend the money on actual education instead of on layers and layers of bureaucracy that No Child and Race to the Top have creating and are continuing to create. Adding administrative positions to measure outcomes, organize testing, and apply for federal money that is just going to be spent on more layers of administration doesn't actually help students. The fundamental flaw in the report's conclusion is captured in your headline: the word "arbitrarily". That word suggests that the judging was merely one of convenience. Criticizing the judging as "subjective" is more accurate but is still a stupid criticism.

When the Pulitzer Prizes were handed out, did you criticize the judging for being "subjective"? No, that's part of the judging process. In fact, let's face it: The whole idea of "judging" is based on the idea of subjectivity. If there were completely objective/measurable criteria, a computer would be able to analyze the applications. Human judges would be unnecessary.

ALL GRANTS are subjectively judged. Duh. For example, people apply for NIH grants, and, despite the use of criteria in scoring, everyone is well aware that other scientists are rating the grants, USING THEIR SUBJECTIVE JUDGMENT. prejudiced against the grant), but there's no "objective" way to determine whether one grant application is more or less innovative than another's. It's just the reviewer's own SUBJECTIVE judgment.

It's stupid to think that this "Race to the Top" grant process was somehow tainted by "subjective" judgments. I'm simply saying that this bred 13s 2013 report is absurd for complaining about "subjective" or "arbitrary" judging.

I think most people could see through the false claim to objectivity. States were still being judged, and for all of the veneer of objectivity lent by a point system, everybody kind of knew that judges made decisions and awarded points based on their own biases. This is always the case, and it is not necessarily a bad thing that decisions are made subjectively. Most important decisions in life are.