Department of Education

INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Fiscal Year 2014 Request 

CONTENTS

Page

Appropriations Language ........................................................................................................H-1

Appropriation Adjustments and Transfers ...............................................................................H-2

Summary of Changes .............................................................................................................H-4

Authorizing Legislation............................................................................................................H-7

Appropriations History...........................................................................................................H-10

Significant Items in FY 2013 Appropriations Reports.............................................................H-11

Summary of Request ............................................................................................................H-13

Activities:

Race to the top................................................................................................................H-19

Investing in innovation.....................................................................................................H-25

STEM Innovation:

STEM innovation networks........................................................................................H-32

Mathematics and science partnerships......................................................................H-41

High school redesign.......................................................................................................H-47

Excellent instructional teams...........................................................................................H-51

Excellent instructional teams consolidations:

Improving teacher quality State grants.......................................................................H-57

Teacher incentive fund ..............................................................................................H-67

Transition to teaching ................................................................................................H-73

Teacher quality partnership .......................................................................................H-79

School leadership............................................................................................................H-86

Expanding educational options........................................................................................H-91

Expanding educational options consolidations:

Charter schools grants ..............................................................................................H-94

Credit enhancement for charter school facilities ......................................................H-103

Magnet schools assistance ...........................................................................................H-108

Fund for the improvement of education: programs of national significance....................H-114

State tables*

*State tables reflecting final 2013 allocations and 2014 estimates will be posted on the Department’s Web page at: 

http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/statetables/index.html#update.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-1

Appropriations Language

NOTE

No appropriations language is included for this account. All programs would be authorized under the Elementary 

and Secondary Education Act; when new authorizing legislations for the Elementary and Secondary Education Act is 

enacted, a budget request for these programs will be proposed.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-2

Appropriation Adjustments and Transfers

(dollars in thousands)

Appropriation/Adjustments/Transfers 2012 2013 2014

Discretionary:

Discretionar y Appropriation.......................................................... $1,530,429 $1,527,536 $5,335,000

Discretionar y Across-the board reduction (P.L. 112-74)............... -2,893 0 0

Discretionar y Across-the board increase (P.L. 112-175).............. 0 9,349 0

Total, adjusted discretionary appropriation ......... 1,527,536 1,536,885 5,335,000

Discretionar y Comparative transfer to:

Education Improvement Programs for:

Advanced placement.......................................... -26,949 -26,949 0

Ready-to-learn television.................................... -27,194 -27,194 0

Arts in education ................................................ -24,953 -24,953 0

Discretionar y Comparative transfer from:

Education Improvement Programs for:

Improving teacher quality State grants ............... 2,466,567 2,466,567 0

Mathematics and science partnerships............... 149,717 149,717 0

Higher Education for:

Teacher quality partnership ................................ 42,833 42,833 0

Discretionar y Reprogramming transfer to:

Education Improvement Programs for:

Advanced placement.......................................... -3,106 -3,106 0

Total, comparative discretionary 

appropriation.............................................. 4,104,451 4,113,800 5,335,000

Mandatory:

Appropriation 0 5,000,000 0

Total, comparable discretionary and 

mandatory appropriation 4,104,451 9,113,800 5,335,000
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Appropriation Adjustments and Transfers—continued

(dollars in thousands)

H-3

Appropriation/Adjustments/Transfers 2012 2013 2014

Advance:

Advance for succeeding fiscal year ....................... -1,681,441 -1,681,441 0

Advance from prior year........................................ 1,678,263 1,681,441 1,681,441

Total, budget authority........................................ 4,101,273 9,113,800 7,016,441

Comparative transfer from:

Education Improvement Programs for:

Improving teacher quality State grants

Advance for succeeding fiscal year............... 1,681,441 1,681,441 0

Advance from prior year ............................... -1,678,263 -1,681,441 -1,681,441

Total, comparable budget authority......... 4,104,451 9,113,800 5,335,000

NOTE: Amounts for transferred programs exclude the 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided by 

P.L. 112-175. The comparable total 0.612 percent across-the-board increase for the account is $14,829 thousand.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-4

Summary of Changes

(dollars in thousands)

2012......................................................................................... $4,104,451

2014........................................................................................... 5,335,000

Net change from 2012............................... +1,230,549

Increases: 2012 base

Change

from base

Program:

Program Increase for a reauthorized Race to the Top program to 

support and create incentives for State and local 

reforms designed to lead to significant improvements in 

student achievement, high school graduation rates, and 

college enrollment rates, and to significant reductions in 

achievement gaps. $548,960 +$451,040

Program Increase for a reauthorized Investing in Innovation 

program to expand innovative strategies and practices 

that have been shown to be effective in improving 

educational outcomes for students and to test and 

evaluate promising strategies and practices whose 

efficacy has not yet been systematically studied. 149,417 +65,583

Initial funding for the new Science, Technology, 

Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Innovation 

initiative to help improve student engagement and 

achievement in STEM subjects. 0 +414,716

Initial funding for the new High School Redesign

program to transform teaching and learning in high 

schools by encouraging partnerships among LEAs, 

postsecondary institutions, businesses, and non-profits 

to prepare students for college and career. 0 +300,000

Initial funding for the new Effective Teachers and 

Leaders State Grants program to provide formula grants 

to States and LEAs to improve the effectiveness and 

equitable distribution of effective and highly effective 

teachers and leaders and, through an expanded setaside of funds, to support efforts to build evidence on 

how best to best recruit, prepare, and support effective 

teachers and school leaders, and enhance the teaching 

and leadership professions. 0 +$2,466,567
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Summary of Changes—continued 

(dollars in thousands)

H-5

Increases: 2012 base

Change

from base

Program:

Increase for the School Leadership program to train 

highly effective leaders for high-need schools and 

districts. $29,107 +$68,887

Program Initial funding for the new Teacher and Leader 

Innovation Fund to support the development and 

implementation of innovative teacher and leader 

policies. 0 +400,000

Program Initial funding for the Expanding Educational Options 

program to increase the supply of high-quality public 

educational options available to students, especially 

students attending low-performing schools, by creating 

and expanding effective charter and autonomous 

schools. 0 +294,836

Increase for the Magnet Schools Assistance program to 

help LEAs implement desegregation plans for the 

support of high-quality magnet schools and to expand 

and improve options for students and increase diversity

in schools. 96,705 +2,906

Increase for the Fund for the Improvement in Education 

activities to fund a math initiative, to support 

interagency strategies to strengthen services to 

disconnected youth, to continue the Data Quality 

Initiative, and to enhance communities’ tracking of and 

performance on multiple outcomes for at-risk youth. 40,823 +5,453

Subtotal, increases +4,469,988
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Summary of Changes—continued 

(dollars in thousands)

H-6

Decreases: 2012 base

Change

from base

Program:

Program Eliminate funding for Mathematics and Science 

Partnerships because it would be replaced by the 

proposed Effective Teaching and Learning: 

Science, Technology, Engineering, and 

Mathematics program. $149,716 -$149,716

Program: Elimination of Improving Teacher Quality State 

Grants and redirection of funding to the proposed 

Effective Teachers and Leaders program. 2,466,567 -2,466,567

Program:Elimination of the Transition to Teaching and 

Teacher Quality Partnership programs and 

redirection of funding to the School Leadership

program. 68,887 -68,887

Program Elimination of the Teacher Incentive Fund and 

redirection of funding to the proposed Teacher and 

Leader Innovation Fund. 299,433 -299,433

Elimination of the Charter Schools Grants and 

Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities 

programs and redirection of funding to the 

proposed Expanding Educational Options 

program. 254,836 -254,836

Subtotal, decreases -3,239,439

Net change +1,230,549
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-7

Authorizing Legislation

(dollars in thousands)

Activity

2013

Authorized

footnote

2013

Estimate

footnote

2014

Authorized

footnote

2014

Request

footnote

Race to the top (ARRA-XIV-14006) 01 $548,960 To be determined1 $1,000,000

Investing in innovation (ARRA-XIV-14007) 01 149,417 To be determined1 215,000

STEM innovation:

STEM innovation (proposed legislation) -- -- To be determined 414,7160

Mathematics and science partnerships (ESEA II-B) 02 149,716 02 0

High school transformation (proposed legislation) -- -- To be determined 300,000

Excellent instructional teams: (EIT)

Effective teachers and leaders: (ETL)

(ETL)Effective teacher and leaders State grants (proposed 

legislation) -- -- To be determined 2,466,567

(ETL)Improving teacher quality State grants (ESEA II-A) 02 2,466,567 02 0

(TLP)Transition to teaching (ESEA II-C-1-B) 02 26,054 02 0

(TLP)Teacher quality partnership (HEA II-A) Indefinite3 42,833 Indefinite3 0

(TLP)School leadership (ESEA II-A-5-2151(b)) 02 29,107 02 97,994

Teacher and leader innovation fund: (TLIF)

(TLIF)Teacher and leader innovation fund (proposed 

legislation) -- -- To be determined 400,000

(TLIF)Teacher incentive fund (ESEA V-D-1) 02 299,433 02 0

Expanding educational options: (EEO)

(EEO)Expanding educational options (proposed legislation) -- -- To be determined 294,836

(EEO)Charter schools grants (ESEA V-B-1) 02 254,8364 02 0

H-7
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Authorizing Legislation—continued

(dollars in thousands)

H-8

Activity

2013

Authorized

footnote

2013

Estimate

footnote

2014

Authorized

footnote

2014

Request

footnote

(EEO)Credit enhancement for charter school facilities 

(ESEA V-B-2) 05 04 05 0

Magnet schools assistance (ESEA V-C) 06 $96,705 To be determined6 $99,611

FIE programs of national significance (ESEA V-D-1) 06 40,823 To be determined6 46,276

Recognizing education success, professional excellence, 

and collaborative teaching (proposed legislation)

To be 

determined7 5,000,000 07 0

Unfunded authorizations: (UA)

(UA)Advanced credentialing (ESEA II-A-5-2521(c)) 02 0 02 0

(UA)Voluntary public school choice (ESEA V-B-3) 02 0 02 0

(UA)Advanced placement and international baccalaureate 

programs (America COMPETES Act VI-A-II) 08 0 08 0

(UA)Ready to teach (ESEA V-D-8) 02 0 02 0

(UA)Exchanges with historic whaling and trading partners 

(ESEA V-D-12) 09 0 09 0

(UA)Parental information and resource centers (ESEA V-D16) 02 0 02 0

(UA)Women’s educational equity (ESEA V-D-21) 09 0 09 0

Total definite authorization 0 0

H-8
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Authorizing Legislation—continued

(dollars in thousands)

H-9

Activity

2013

Authorized

footnote

2013

Estimate

footnote

2014

Authorized

footnote

2014

Request

footnote

Total discretionary appropriation 9,104,451 5,335,000

Portion of request subject to reauthorization 243,881

Portion of request not authorized $5,091,119

Total mandatory appropriation $5,000,000 0

Total discretionary appropriation including 

0.612 percent ATB increase 4,113,800

NOTE: Excludes 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175. 1 The program is authorized in FY 2013 through appropriations language; reauthorizing legislation is sought for FY 2014. 2 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. The program is proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 under new legislation. 3 The program is proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 under new legislation. 4 From the amount appropriated for Charter Schools, the fiscal year 2012 appropriations act required the Secretary to use not less than $22,957 thousand

for State Facilities Incentive grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities grants. The Department expects to use the same amount for State 

Facilities Incentive Grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities in FY 2013. 5 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2004. The program is proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 under new legislation. 6 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008; reauthorizing legislation is sought for FY 2014. 7 Authorization for the program is sought for FY 2013. No reauthorizing legislation is sought for FY 2014. 8 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2011. No appropriations language or reauthorizing legislation is sought. 9 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. No appropriations language or reauthorizing legislation is sought.

H-9
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-10

Appropriations History

(dollars in thousands)

Year

Budget 

Estimate 

to Congress

House 

Allowance Foot

-

note

Senate 

Allowance Foot

-

note Appropriation Footnote

2005 Discretionary $885,161 $669,936 $1,154,894 $1,092,642

2006 Discretionary 1,307,871 708,522 1,308,785 936,488

2007 Discretionary 850,966 N/A1 N/A1 837,686

2008 Discretionary 922,018 982,354 962,889 985,517

2009 Discretionary 867,517 976,8462 944,3142 996,425

Recovery Act Supplemental 

(PL 111-5) (Discretionary) 0 225,000 0 200,000

2010 Discretionary 1,489,949 1,347,363 1,234,7873 1,389,065

Rescission (PL 111-226) 

(Discretionary) -10,700

2011 Discretionary 6,330,000 1,870,1234 2,224,8433 1,856,1795

2012 Discretionary 4,995,000 821,4116 1,740,2126 1,527,536

2013 Discretionary 4,332,166 663,0807 1,545,9667 1,536,8858

2013 Mandatory 5,000,000 0 0

2014 Discretionary 5,335,000

1 This account operated under a full-year continuing resolution (P.L. 110-5). House and Senate allowances are 

shown as N/A (Not Available) because neither body passed a separate appropriations bill. 2 The levels for the House and Senate allowances reflect action on the regular annual 2009 appropriations bill, 

which proceeded in the 110th Congress only through the House Subcommittee and the Senate Committee. 3 The level for the Senate allowance reflects Committee action only. 4 The level for the House allowance reflect the House-passed full-year continuing resolution. 5 The level for appropriation reflects the Department of Defense and Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011 

(P.L. 112-10). 6 The level for the House allowance reflects an introduced bill and the level for the Senate allowance reflects 

Senate Committee action only. 7 The levels for the House and Senate allowances reflect action on the regular annual 2013 appropriations bill, 

which proceeded in the 112th Congress only through the House Subcommittee and the Senate Committee. 8 The amount shown includes the 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided by P.L. 112-175, in effect 

through March 27, 2013.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-11

Significant Items in FY 2013 Appropriations Reports

Race to the Top

Senate: Committee expects a significant portion of the fiscal year 2013 appropriation to 

be used for RTT–ELC. In combination with additional resources allocated for the 

CCDBG and Head Start programs, the Committee expects these investments to 

help improve early learning and development systems and opportunities for 

young children. The Committee bill includes language requiring the Departments 

of Education and HHS to jointly administer RTT–ELC.

Response: The Department plans to use a significant portion of the fiscal year 2013 

appropriation for RTT-ELC.

Senate: The Committee applauds the Department’s efforts to ensure that rural areas 

have a fair opportunity to compete in recent grant competitions, including the 

LEA-level competition under RTT. The Committee directs the Department in 

developing any fiscal year 2013 notice under RTT to provide an absolute priority 

for rural States or rural LEAs, as applicable.

Response: The Department plans to include absolute priorities for applicants serving rural 

areas in the fiscal year 2013 Race to the Top-District competition whether or not 

those applicants are in States with a Race to the Top-State grant. 

Investing in Innovation

Senate: The Committee expects the Department to distribute grants equally among the 

absolute priority categories unless there are an insufficient number of qualified 

grants for a particular category.

Response: The Department intends to provide awards in all absolute priority categories for

which applications of sufficient quality are received and for which funding is 

available. However, the final number of grants made under each absolute 

priority category will depend on several factors, including the number and quality 

of applications received under each absolute priority, and the total amount of 

funding requested by applicants.

Charter Schools Grants

Senate: The Committee urges the Department to continue using a portion of the funds 

available for national activities to address issues related to services to students 

with disabilities enrolled in or interested in enrolling in charter schools, as well as 

efforts to strengthen charter authorizing practices that will result in a greater 

share of high-quality charter schools.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Significant Items in FY 2012 Appropriations Reports—continued 

H-12

Response: The Department will continue to use national activities funds in fiscal year 2013 

to support efforts to ensure access to charter schools, and improve services in 

those schools, for students with disabilities as well as efforts to improve charter 

authorizing practices and strengthen authorizer capacity, including through 

technical assistance and other resources provided by the National Charter 

School Resource Center and data collection and monitoring activities.

Fund for the Improvement in Education: Programs of National Significance

Senate: Within programs of national significance, the Committee includes $29 million to 

continue the initiative funded in last year’s bill that provides competitive awards to 

national not-for-profit organizations or school libraries for providing books and 

childhood literacy activities to children and families living in high-need 

communities. The Committee expects no less than 50 percent of these funds to 

be made available to applications from school libraries proposing high quality 

projects for increasing access to a wide range of print and electronic resources 

that provide learning opportunities to all students, but particularly those less likely 

to have access to such materials at home.

Response: In accordance with the Committee's expectation, the Department plans to use 

$29 million provided by the Committee to fund continuations for grants made 

under the Innovative Approaches to Literacy initiative in fiscal year 2012. From 

the 2012 slate, the Department awarded no less than 50 percent of fiscal year

2012 funds to applications from LEAs (on behalf of school libraries) for highquality school library projects that increase access to a wide range of literacy 

resources (either print or electronic) and provide learning opportunities to all 

students.

Arts in Education

Senate: The Committee appreciates the recent release of the arts education report 

prepared by NCES. The Committee believes that this survey should be 

conducted more frequently than once every 10 years. The Committee also 

directs the Department to take more effective steps in disseminating what is 

being learned through the model and professional development grants funded 

under the Arts in Education program.

Response: The Department will make every effort to more effectively disseminate findings 

from the Arts Models and Professional Development grants funded under Arts in 

Education.
Summary of Request

Click here for accessible version 

(in thousands of dollars) 2014

Category 2012 2013 President's

Account, Program and Activity Code Appropriation Appropriation Budget Amount Percent

Innovation and Instructional Teams

 1. Race to the Top (AARA XIV, sec. 14006) D 548,960 548,960 1,000,000 451,040 82.163%

 2. Investing in innovation (AARA XIV, sec. 14007) D 149,417 149,417 215,000 65,583 43.893%

 3. STEM innovation 

(a) STEM innovation networks (proposed legislation) D 0 0 414,716 414,716 ---

(b) Mathematics and science partnerships (ESEA II, Part B) D 149,716 149,716 0 (149,716) -100.000%

Subtotal 149,716 149,716 414,716 265,000 177.002%

 4. High school redesign (proposed legislation) D 0 0 300,000 300,000 ---

 5. Excellent instructional teams:

(a) Effective teachers and leaders: 

(1) Effective teachers and leaders State grants (proposed legislation) D 0 0 2,466,567 2,466,567 ---

(2) Improving teacher quality State grants (ESEA II-A)

Annual appropriation D 785,126 785,126 0 (785,126) -100.000%

Advance for succeeding fiscal year D 1,681,441 1,681,441 0 (1,681,441) -100.000%

Subtotal 2,466,567 2,466,567 2,466,567 0 0.000%

(3) Transition to teaching (ESEA II-C-1-B) D 26,054 26,054 0 (26,054) -100.000%

(4) Teacher quality partnership (HEA II-A) D 42,833 42,833 0 (42,833) -100.000%

(5) School leadership (ESEA section 2151(b)) D 29,107 29,107 97,994 68,887 236.668%

Subtotal D 97,994 97,994 97,994 0 0.000%

(b) Teacher and leader innovation fund: 

(1) Teacher and leader innovation fund (proposed legislation) D 0 0 400,000 400,000 ---

(2) Teacher incentive fund (ESEA V-D-1) D 299,433 299,433 0 (299,433) -100.000%

Subtotal D 299,433 299,433 400,000 100,567 33.586%

NOTES: D = discretionary program, M = mandatory program; FY = fiscal year 

- FY 2013 discretionary appropriation amounts are based on P.L. 112-175, the Continuing Appropriations Resolution, 2013, that provided appropriations through March 27, 2013. FY 2013 mandatory amounts are 

either specifically authorized levels, or are based on FY 2013 President's Budget Policy, updated for more recent estimates of mandatory costs, or FY 2014 President's Budget Policy, as applicable.

- Programs authorized by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act for which funds are requested or that are proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 are proposed under new authorizing legislation. 

- Multiple programs affected by the proposed ESEA reauthorization have been renamed and moved among accounts, some of which also have been renamed. 

- Account totals and programs shown within accounts in FY 2012 and FY 2013 have been adjusted for comparability with the FY 2014 President's Budget.

Detail may not add to totals due to rounding.

2014 President's Budget 

Compared to 2012 Appropriation

H-13
H-14

(in thousands of dollars) 2014

Category 2012 2013 President's

Account, Program and Activity Code Appropriation Appropriation Budget Amount Percent

Innovation and Instructional Teams (continued)

 6. Expanding educational options:

(a) Expanding educational options (proposed legislation) 1 D 0 0 294,836 294,836 ---

(b) Charter schools grants (ESEA V-B-1) 1, 2 D 254,836 254,836 0 (254,836) -100.000%

(c) Credit enhancement for charter school facilities (ESEA Title V-B-2) 1 D 0 0 0 0 ---

Subtotal D 254,836 254,836 294,836 40,000 15.696%

 7. Magnet schools assistance (ESEA V-C) 2 D 96,705 96,705 99,611 2,906 3.005%

 8. Fund for the improvement of education: Programs of national significance (ESEA V-D-1) D 40,823 40,823 46,276 5,453 13.358%

Subtotal 137,528 137,528 145,887 8,359 6.078%

 9. Recognizing Education Success, Professional Excellence, and Collaborative Teaching (RESPECT) M 0 5,000,000 0 ---

(proposed legislation) 

Total, Appropriation 2, 3 4,104,451 4,104,451 5,335,000 1,230,549 29.981%

Total, Budget authority 4,101,273 4,104,451 7,016,441 2,915,168 71.080%

Current 4 2,423,010 2,423,010 5,335,000 2,911,990 120.181%

Prior year's advance 1,678,263 1,681,441 1,681,441 3,178 0.189%

Across-the-board 0.612% increase applied to discretionary appropriation, provided in P.L. 112-175. 14,829

NOTES: D = discretionary program, M = mandatory program; FY = fiscal year 

- FY 2013 discretionary appropriation amounts are based on P.L. 112-175, the Continuing Appropriations Resolution, 2013, that provided appropriations through March 27, 2013. FY 2013 mandatory amounts are 

either specifically authorized levels, or are based on FY 2013 President's Budget Policy, updated for more recent estimates of mandatory costs, or FY 2014 President's Budget Policy, as applicable.

- Programs authorized by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act for which funds are requested or that are proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 are proposed under new authorizing legislation. 

- Multiple programs affected by the proposed ESEA reauthorization have been renamed and moved among accounts, some of which also have been renamed. 

- Account totals and programs shown within accounts in FY 2012 and FY 2013 have been adjusted for comparability with the FY 2014 President's Budget.

Detail may not add to totals due to rounding.

1 From the amount appropriated for Charter Schools Grants, FY 2012 appropriations language required the Department to use no less than $22,957 thousand for State Facilities Incentive Grants and Credit Enhancement 

for Charter School Facilities. The Department expects to use the same amount for State Facilities Incentive Grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities in FY 2013. The FY 2014 request would 

subsume both programs into the proposed Expanding Educational Options program.

2 Reflects a reprogramming in FY 2012 of $2,906 thousand from Magnet Schools Assistance and $200 thousand from Charter Schools Grants to Advanced Placement, under the Education Improvement Programs account. 3 Adjusted for comparability. In fiscal years 2012 and 2013, includes $2,466,567 thousand for Improving Teacher Quality State Grants and $149,716 thousand for Mathematics and Science Partnerships, appropriated 

in those years to the Education Improvement Programs account; and $42,833 thousand for Teacher Quality Partnership, appropriated in those years to the Higher Education account. 

4 Adjusted for comparability. In fiscal years 2012 and 2013, excludes $30,055 thousand for Advanced Placement, $27,194 thousand for Ready-to-Learn Television, and $24,953 thousand for Arts in Education, requested in the 

FY 2014 President's Budget in the Education Improvement Programs account. Also excludes advanced appropriations of $1,681,441 thousand in fiscal years 2012 and 2013 that become available on October 1 

of the following fiscal year. Advance appropriations shown in this account were for Improving Teacher Quality State Grants and were appropriated in fiscal years 2012 and 2013 in the School Improvement Programs account, 

now the Education Improvement Programs account.

Compared to 2012 Appropriation

2014 President's Budget 

H-14
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-15

Summary of Request

Programs in the Innovation and Instructional Teams account support the goal of improving 

student achievement in three key ways: providing incentives for States and local educational 

agencies (LEAs) to implement comprehensive educational reforms and to test, evaluate, and

expand innovative educational strategies and practices, including in science, technology, 

mathematics, and science (STEM); increasing the supply of effective teachers and principals; 

and providing parents with expanded options for the education of their children. The 

Administration requests a total of $5.3 billion in discretionary funds.

The new structure of this account reflects the framework of the Administration’s proposal for 

reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. A key objective of this 

proposal is to increase efficiency by consolidating currently authorized programs with similar 

purposes. In fiscal years 2012 and 2013, for example, the Department’s appropriation 

contained several programs focused on teaching and school leadership issues with different 

purposes, requirements, and authorized activities.

While each of these programs has worthy goals, the result of these fragmented funding streams 

has been inefficiencies at the Federal, State, and local levels; grantees have had to deal with 

numerous small grant competitions with different applications and requirements rather than 

focusing on improving outcomes for students, and the Department has had to focus on running 

separate grant competitions and monitoring compliance with different programs rather than on 

providing strong support and directing funding to the most proven or promising practices. The 

Administration expects that the new structure for programs in this account will allow States and 

LEAs to identify how to best meet the needs of their students and teachers, and allow the 

Department to focus funding on programs that improve student achievement, especially for 

students in high-need schools.

System-wide Reform and Innovation

The Administration requests $1.3 billion to support efforts to drive State and local reform and 

innovation. Specifically, the request includes:

• $1.0 billion for the Race to the Top program to support grants to States that can 

demonstrate the capacity and willingness to undertake reforms and innovations to improve 

college access, affordability, quality, and completion. Under this new initiative, States would 

be required to demonstrate a commitment to reforms in key areas and their projects would 

result in the identification, dissemination, adoption, and use of effective policies and 

practices.

• $215.0 million for the Investing in Innovation program to expand innovative strategies and 

practices that have been shown to be effective in improving educational outcomes for 

students and to test and evaluate promising practices, strategies, or programs whose 

efficacy has not yet been systematically studied. Funds would also support the Advanced 

Research Projects Agency-Education (ARPA-ED), a new entity modeled after similar 

agencies in the Department of Defense and Department of Energy. The mission of ARPAED would be to pursue development of educational technology and learning systems; 

support systems for educators; and tools that result in improvements for all students (but 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Summary of Request—continued

H-16

especially those from low-income backgrounds) by increasing educational achievement and 

attainment for students in both traditional and non-traditional learning environments.

• $46.3 million for the Fund for the Improvement of Education: Programs of National 

Significance (FIE) to support nationally significant projects to improve the quality of 

elementary and secondary education, including continuation of a data quality initiative that 

helps improve the quality, analysis, and reporting of Department of Education elementary 

and secondary education data. Of the amount requested, the Department would use 

$30.0 million to run an evidence-based grant competition, in partnership with the National 

Science Foundation, focused on developing, evaluating, and scaling proven practices that 

can help increase student achievement in mathematics. The Department would also use 

$10.0 million to support activities to strengthen services provided to disconnected youth and 

$5.0 million to support a youth data pilot.

STEM Innovation

The Administration requests $414.7 million to help increase the number of students effectively 

prepared for postsecondary education and careers in STEM fields, including: 

• $150.0 million for a new STEM Innovation Networks initiative to help improve student 

engagement and achievement in STEM subjects by developing, validating, and scaling 

up innovative and effective STEM educational practices in networks of participating 

schools. 

• $80.0 million in support of the Administration’s goal of recruiting and preparing, over

10 years, 100,000 effective and highly effective STEM teachers through STEM Teacher 

Pathways. 

• $35.0 million to establish a STEM Master Teacher Corps that would provide leadership 

roles for highly effective STEM teachers and help improve STEM instruction. 

• $149.7 million for Effective Teaching and Learning: Science, Technology, 

Engineering, and Mathematics to support comprehensive State and local efforts to 

improve STEM education through such activities as professional development for STEM 

teachers and implementation of high-quality curriculum, instructional materials, and 

assessments.

High School Redesign

The Administration requests $300.0 million for a new competitive High School Redesign

program to help redesign high schools to prepare students to be college- and career-ready by

using existing Federal, State, and local resources and creation of learning models that are 

rigorous, relevant, and focus on real-world experiences while incorporating personalized 

learning and career and college exploration.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Summary of Request—continued

H-17

Excellent Instructional Teams

The Administration requests $3.0 billion for the new Excellent Instructional Teams programs, 

which would provide both formula grants and competitive awards to help States and LEAs 

increase the effectiveness of teachers and principals.

• $2.5 billion for Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants to provide flexible, formulabased support for States and LEAs that commit to improving their teacher and principal 

evaluation systems and ensuring that low-income and minority students have equitable 

access to teachers and principals who are effective at raising student achievement. A 

25 percent national activities set-aside totaling nearly $617 million would allow the 

Department to build evidence on how best to recruit, prepare, and support effective teachers 

and school leaders, and invest in efforts to enhance the teaching and leadership 

professions. 

• $400 million for the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund, an increase of $100 million, to 

help States and LEAs improve the effectiveness of teachers and leaders in high-need 

schools and LEAs, in particular by creating the conditions to identify, recruit, prepare, 

support, retain, and advance effective and highly effective teachers, teacher leaders, 

principals, and school leadership teams in those schools. 

• $98 million for a redesigned School Leadership Program that would more than triple the 

Federal investment in principal training. The 2014 competition would support grants for 

high-quality, large-scale professional development for school leaders that build evidence of 

effectiveness. Funded projects would help current principals and school leadership teams 

strengthen essential school leadership skills (such as evaluating and providing feedback to 

teachers, analyzing student data, developing school leadership teams, and creating a 

positive school climate), and deepen school leaders’ understanding of college-and careerready standards and effective instruction aligned to those standards.

The new programs would replace an array of current activities that address teaching and school 

leadership issues: Improving Teacher Quality State Grants, the Teacher Incentive Fund, 

Transition to Teaching, and Teacher Quality Partnership. 

The Administration proposes $5 billion in mandatory funding for the Recognizing Education 

Success, Professional Excellence, and Collaborative Teaching (RESPECT) Project, which 

would help States and districts dramatically reshape the teaching profession. Funds would be 

used to reform teacher and principal preparation programs; strengthen teacher and principal 

evaluation and professional development systems; redesign educator career ladders and 

compensation systems to attract and retain top talent; and create conditions in schools that 

support effective teaching, including by providing teachers greater autonomy, shared leadership 

and responsibility for student outcomes, and time for collaboration.

Expanding Educational Options

The Administration requests $294.8million for the new Expanding Educational Options 

program to support competitive grants to State educational agencies (SEAs), charter school 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Summary of Request—continued

H-18

authorizers, charter management organizations, local educational agencies and other nonprofit 

organizations to start or expand high-performing charter schools and other autonomous public 

schools. The Department would also be authorized to make competitive grants to high-need 

LEAs, and to SEAs in partnership with one or more high-need LEAs, for the development and 

implementation of comprehensive programs of public school choice that increase the range of 

high-quality educational options available to students and help improve the academic 

achievement of students attending low-performing schools. All grantees would also be required 

to fund or operate parent information and outreach programs to make families and students 

aware of their options.

This new program would replace currently or recently funded programs that aim to increase 

public school options and family involvement in education, including Charter Schools Grants,

Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities, Voluntary Public School Choice,

Parental Information and Resource Centers, and Smaller Learning Communities.

In addition, the Administration requests $99.6 million for Magnet Schools Assistance to LEAs 

to establish and operate magnet schools that are part of an approved desegregation plan.

 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-19

Activities:

Race to the top

(American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Title XIV, section 14006)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined

Budget Authority:

2012 2013 2014

Change 

from 2012

$548,960 $548,9601 $1,000,000 +$451,040

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Race to the Top program (RTT) creates incentives for comprehensive State and local 

reforms and innovations designed to lead to significant improvements in student achievement, 

high school graduation rates, college enrollment rates, and rates of college persistence and 

completion, and to significant reductions in achievement gaps, including for students with 

disabilities and English learners. In the first 3 years of the program, the RTT competition’s 

focused on the implementation of ambitious plans in five core reform areas: (1) adopting 

standards and assessments that measure the progress of the educational system in preparing 

students to succeed in college and the workplace and to compete in the global economy; 

(2) building data systems that measure student growth and success and inform teachers and 

principals about how they can improve instruction; (3) recruiting, developing, rewarding, and 

retaining effective teachers and principals, especially where they are needed most; (4) turning 

around the lowest-achieving schools; and (5) improving State and local systems of early 

learning. In addition, the program encourages the broad identification, dissemination, adoption, 

and use of effective State and local policies and practices that lead to significant improvement in 

outcomes for all children and youth and the elimination of those policies and practices that are 

not effective in improving student outcomes.

With funds provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act), the 

Department invested a total of more than $4 billion in the plans of 11 States and the District of 

Columbia based on their recent record of improving student outcomes and on their record of 

and commitment to putting in place conditions for innovation and reform. Applications were also 

evaluated based on the quality and likelihood of success of the applicants’ comprehensive and 

coherent plans for improving student achievement and attaining the other objectives of the 

program, including the level of support from relevant stakeholders. In addition, the Department 

made awards to two consortia of States under the Race to the Top Assessment program (RTTA). The consortia are working to develop assessments that are valid, support and inform 

instruction, provide accurate information about what students know and can do, and measure 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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H-20

student achievement against standards designed to ensure that all students gain the knowledge 

and skills needed to succeed in college and the workplace.

The 2011 Appropriations Act provided nearly $700 million in additional funding for RTT, which 

allowed the Department to award grants based on previously submitted applications, and 

amended the Recovery Act to permit the Department to make grants to improve early learning. 

The Department used approximately $200 million of these funds to make awards to seven of the 

highest-ranked but unfunded finalist States from the previous Recovery Act competition. The 

seven States that received new awards from the $200 million are using grant funds to carry out 

a selection of the key activities included in their original applications, including activities to 

improve science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education.

In addition, the Department used approximately $500 million for a new Race to the Top – Early 

Learning Challenge (RTT-ELC) competition in fiscal year 2011. The RTT-ELC competition was 

designed to encourage State efforts to better coordinate, develop, implement, and evaluate their 

systems of early learning, with the overall goal of improving the quality of early learning 

programs and services for high-need children birth to age five and closing the school readiness 

gap between children with high needs and their peers. Nine States shared the $497 million in 

fiscal year 2011 funds awarded through this competition.

The 2012 Appropriations Act allowed the use of RTT funds to support and encourage districtlevel reform and innovation through an RTT competition for local educational agencies (LEAs) 

focused on bold, innovative reform at the local level. In fiscal year 2012, the Race to the TopDistrict (RTT-D) competition invited applicants to demonstrate how they would personalize 

education for all students in their schools, building on the experiences of States in implementing 

reforms in the four core educational assurance areas. The competition encouraged and 

rewarded LEAs and consortia of LEAs that had the best plans for implementing the strategies, 

structures, and systems needed to support personalized, student-focused approaches to 

learning and teaching that will produce excellence and ensure equity for all students. Grantees 

will create opportunities for students to identify and pursue areas of personal academic 

interest—all while ensuring that each student masters critical areas identified in college- and 

career-ready standards. In fiscal year 2012, the Department awarded $383 million to 16 RTT-D 

applicants representing 55 LEAs. In addition, the Department used $133 million to make 

awards to five additional States that submitted applications in the fiscal year 2011 RTT-ELC

competition. 

In fiscal year 2013, the Department plans to conduct a new RTT-ELC competition as well as a 

competition for a second round of RTT-D grants. 

The Department awarded a contract in 2010 to run the RTT Technical Assistance Network.

Initial technical assistance efforts have been guided by the needs and requests of the first two 

cohorts of grantee States, but will include reports and other technical assistance that will be 

broadly available to both grantee and non-grantee States. Network reports and other resources 

are available at http://www2.ed.gov/about/inits/ed/implementation-support-unit/techassist/resources.html. 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009...................................................................$4,350,000

2010...................................................................................0

2011 .......................................................................698,600

2012........................................................................548,960

2013........................................................................548,9601

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $1.0 billion in fiscal year 2014 funding for RTT, an increase of 

$451 million over the fiscal year 2012 level. The full amount would be used to support a Race 

to the Top – College Affordability and Completion competition, a new initiative designed to drive 

comprehensive change in State higher education policies and practices in order to improve 

college access, affordability, completion, and quality nationwide. 

To date, the RTT program has leveraged funding to spur significant, system-wide reforms in 

elementary and secondary education, as well as in early education. Building on the success of 

this program, the Administration will shift the focus of RTT in 2014 to comprehensive reforms in 

postsecondary education, establishing RTT as a fund that promotes system-wide reform efforts 

and can shift its focus each year to support the most promising and comprehensive solutions to 

strengthen public education and improve outcomes from preschool through college. Given the 

extraordinary response generated by the initial RTT competitions, we expect a similarly strong 

response from the postsecondary education community. Extending the RTT program to the 

Nation’s higher education system should result in major benefits through the broad 

identification, dissemination, adoption, and use of effective policies and practices, and the 

cessation of ineffective ones while also benefitting the K-12 system by spurring greater 

alignment between high school graduation and college entrance requirements. 

With the funds requested for fiscal year 2014, the Department would support grants to States 

that can demonstrate the capacity and willingness to undertake reforms and innovations to 

improve college access, affordability, and quality, achieve better student outcomes, and 

increase institutional capacity to graduate more students from college with high-quality 

credentials. States seeking funding under this new initiative would be required to demonstrate a 

commitment to reforms in areas such as: (1) sustaining fiscal support for higher education while 

modernizing funding policies to constrain costs and improve outcomes; (2) removing barriers 

preventing the creation of innovative methods of student learning and new degree pathways; 

(3) empowering consumer choice through increased transparency; and (4) smoothing 

transitions for students from high school into college, for adult learners into and returning to 

college, and between institutions of higher education. The Administration’s Elementary and 

Secondary Education Act (ESEA) reauthorization proposal would consolidate the Race to the 

Top program within the ESEA. If the Congress does not reauthorize the ESEA prior to 

enactment of the fiscal year 2014 appropriations, the Administration will request authority to 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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H-22

make grants to States willing to undertake these fundamental postsecondary reforms and 

pursue innovative strategies designed to improve student learning outcomes while making 

college more affordable. 

States that are successful in this competition would receive funds to support and augment 

foundational investments that improve the value of students’ postsecondary education, such as 

redesigning courses to improve learning and reduce costs, tackling problems with 

developmental education, or exploring alternative ways to measure learning and award credits 

and degrees. These investments would simultaneously focus on both quality and productivity, 

reflecting the Administration’s belief that States and institutions should strive to increase the 

quality and rigor of the education they are providing while making that education available to 

more students. This dual emphasis on quality and productivity would result in better student 

learning outcomes and increased capacity to graduate more students from college.

This new dimension of the RTT program will also complement funds requested for a First in the 

World (FITW) initiative under the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education 

(FIPSE) in the Higher Education account. These funds would be used to support an evidencebased grant competition, modeled after the Investing in Innovation (i3) program for K-12, to 

support and expand innovative projects that successfully improve college student outcomes, 

enhance quality, and support students as they progress toward their college degrees. 

Additionally, up to $75 million of the funds requested for FITW would be used to support: 

1) projects to develop third-party validation systems that identify competencies, assessments, 

and curricula for specific fields, and 2) Pay for Success awards to providers of free two-year 

degrees, especially in fields supported by validation systems.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Early Learning and K-12

Award funding $517,304 $517,304 0

Peer review of applications 4,571 4,571 0

Technical assistance and evaluation 27,085 27,085 0

Total, Early Learning and K-12 548,960 548,960 0

College Affordability and Completion

Award funding 0 0 $992,000

Peer review of applications 0 0 2,000

Technical assistance and evaluation 0 0 6,000

Total, College Affordability and 

Completion 0 0 1,000,000

Number of awards 0 0 4-10

Average award

0 0

$99,200 -

$248,000

_________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes the 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

The Department has established eight performance measures for the first cohort (also known as 

Phase 1 and Phase 2) of 12 RTT State grantees. The first four measures, designed to gauge 

grantee States’ achievement on the implementation of their RTT plans in the area of teachers 

and leaders, are: (1) the number of teachers and principals in participating LEAs with qualifying

evaluation systems;1 (2) the number of teachers and principals in participating LEAs with 

qualifying evaluation systems who were evaluated as effective or highly effective in the prior 

academic year; (3) the percentage of teachers in schools that are high-poverty, high-minority, or 

both who were evaluated as highly effective in the prior academic year; and (4) the percentage 

of principals leading schools that are high-poverty, high-minority, or both who were evaluated as 

highly effective in the prior academic year. The remaining four measures, which seek to 

determine the program’s effect on student outcomes, are: (1) the number of States that achieve 

greater than the 75th percentile in overall score gains across all States in at least 3 of the 

4 subject-grade combinations (grade 4 reading, grade 4 math, grade 8 reading, and grade 8 

math) on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and have no statistically 

significant increase in exclusion rates for students with disabilities or English learners; (2) the 

number of States that meet their Title I high school graduation rate target; (3) the number of 

States that report an increase in the percentage of students graduating from high school who 

enroll in an institution of higher education; and (4) the number of States that report an increase 

in the number of students who complete at least 1 year’s worth of college credit that is 

applicable to a degree within 2 years of enrollment in an institution of higher education.

The Department has posted the annual performance reports (APRs) submitted by the States for 

school years 2010-11 and 2011-12. These reports allow the Department and the public to 

follow grantees’ progress in implementing their education reform plans and meeting the goals. 

These reports can be found at http://www.rtt-apr.us and 

http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop/performance.html. The RTT APRs document 

grantees’ progress toward the annual and four-year targets set forth by the grantees in their 

applications. Additionally, the APR includes State-reported updates on the laws, statutes, 

regulations, and guidelines that affect key elements of their Race to the Top plans, The majority 

of RTT APR data is self-reported by grantee States, but the source of the NAEP data is the 

National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) and the Department provided Common Core of 

Data (CCD) information for the statewide number of K-12 students and statewide number of 

students eligible for free and reduced price lunch where possible.

The Department established five performance measures for the Comprehensive Assessment 

Systems Grants awarded under RTT-A in 2010. Those measures are: (1) the number of States 

that have formally adopted a common set of college- and career-ready standards in 

mathematics and English language arts (ELA); (2) the number of States that have fully 

implemented the summative assessment components of the assessment systems developed by 

the consortium; (3) the number of institutions of higher education (IHEs) that are working with 

grantees to design and develop the final high school summative assessments in mathematics 

 1 “Qualifying evaluation systems” are those teacher and principal evaluation systems that (a) differentiate effectiveness 

using multiple rating categories that take into account data on student growth as a significant factor, and (b) are designed 

and developed with teacher and principal involvement, and are rigorous, transparent, and fair.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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and ELA; (4) the number of IHEs that have implemented policies that exempt from remedial 

courses and place into credit-bearing college courses students who meet the achievement 

standard for the final high school summative assessments in mathematics and ELA and any 

other placement requirements; and (5) the percentage of direct matriculation students in public 

IHEs who are enrolled in IHEs that are working with grantees to design and develop the final 

high school summative assessments in mathematics and ELA and/or have implemented 

policies that exempt from remedial courses and place into credit-bearing college courses 

students who meet the achievement standard for the final high school summative assessments 

in mathematics and ELA. The Department will have data for these measures in 2015.

The Department will develop separate performance measures for the RTT-ELC competition. At 

a minimum, the implementation measures will be based on the performance measures included 

in the application, including: the number and percentage of early learning and development 

programs participating in a statewide tiered quality rating and improvement system (TQRIS); the 

number of early learning and development programs in the top tiers of the TQRIS; and the 

number and percentage of children with high needs who are enrolled in early learning and 

development programs that are in the top tiers of the TQRIS. In addition, the Department will 

develop appropriate outcome measures for the program.

The Department will also establish, in 2013, separate program performance measures for RTTD grantees to ensure the collection of high-quality, comparable data that will inform the 

assessment of the effectiveness of the program.

In addition to these efforts to gauge program effectiveness through performance measures, the 

Department is conducting or is planning to conduct three key evaluations. First, the Department 

is evaluating the implementation and impact of both the RTT – State and School Improvement 

Grants (SIG) programs. This Evaluation of RTT and SIG involves collecting data from roughly 

60 districts and 525 schools in the 50 States and DC. The study is focusing on (1) the 

implementation of RTT and SIG; (2) the relationship between receipt of RTT funds and student 

outcomes; (3) the impact of the receipt of SIG funds on student outcomes in the lowestachieving schools; and (4) the relationship between the four school turnaround models (and 

related improvement strategies) and student outcomes and school performance. Data 

collection for this study will continue through the 2013-14 school year. The Department expects 

to begin releasing evaluation briefs on specific topics in mid-2013, with the first full report 

scheduled for release in early-2014. Second, the Department is conducting an evaluation of the 

RTT-ELC grantees that will describe the design and implementation plans for the TQRIS

measures in RTT-ELC States and, for grantees that are farther along in implementing their 

TQRIS, examine the components of quality that appear to be the strongest predictors of child 

outcomes. Third, the Department is conducting an evaluation for the RTT-D program. 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-25

Investing in innovation

(American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Sec. 12007)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

$149,417 $149,4171 $215,000 +$65,583

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Investing in Innovation (i3) program promotes the development and expansion of innovative 

practices for which there is evidence of effectiveness. The program is authorized under 

Section 14007 of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009 (the Recovery Act).

Under the program, the Department makes awards on a competitive basis to local educational 

agencies (LEAs) that have demonstrated success in improving student achievement and closed

achievement gaps, or to nonprofit organizations, in consortium with one or more schools or 

LEAs, that have helped LEAs or schools improve achievement and close gaps. 

The i3 program employs a rigorous framework that directs the highest level of funding to 

projects with the strongest evidence base, but also provides significant support for promising 

projects that are willing to undergo rigorous evaluation. Grantees use funds to: (1) scale up 

practices, strategies, or programs for which there is strong evidence that the proposed activity 

has had a significant and positive effect on improving student achievement, closing 

achievement gaps, decreasing dropout rates, or increasing high school graduation rates; 

(2) validate and expand practices, strategies, or programs for which there is moderate evidence 

that the proposed activity has had a significant and positive effect on those same outcomes; or 

(3) develop and test promising practices, strategies, or programs for which there is a strong 

theory or evidence of promise that indicates potential for positive impacts or some positive 

research-based findings, but for which efficacy has not yet been systematically studied. 

Each grantee is also required to support an independent evaluation of its project and to identify 

strategies for expanding the project, if effective, after the grant period expires. In addition, each 

grantee is required to obtain a specified amount of matching funds from the private sector and 

to use funds to develop or expand strategies to improve the performance of high-need students. 

To date the Department has awarded 92 i3 grants, including 5 in the Scale-up category, 28 in 

Validation, and 59 in Development. The Department awarded 49 grants during the first 

competition, held in 2010, comprised of 4 Scale-up, 15 Validation, and 30 Development grants. 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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In 2011 it awarded 23 grants: 1 Scale-up, 5 Validation, and 17 Development grants. In 2012 the 

Department made 20 grant awards—8 Validation and 12 Development grants.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009.................................................................................. 0

Recovery Act ........................................................$650,000

2010.................................................................................. 0

2011........................................................................149,700

2012........................................................................149,417

2013........................................................................149,4171

___________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

For 2014, the Administration requests $215 million for the Investing in Innovation (i3) program, 

an increase of $65.6 million over the 2012 appropriation. The request would build on the 

Department’s success in using program funds to build an evidence base that will help ensure 

that schools and districts have access to innovative strategies and practices that are effective in 

improving educational outcomes for students. In addition, up to 30 percent of the available 

funds would support activities to be carried out by the Advanced Research Projects AgencyEducation (ARPA-ED).

The goal of the i3 program is to improve educational outcomes for students by developing, 

identifying, and scaling up effective practices; while encouraging innovation. The program’s 

emphasis on supporting projects with either evidence of effectiveness or a strong researchbased framework increases the likelihood that funded projects succeed and that we learn more 

about what works. The focus on strong evidence and the requirement for rigorous program 

evaluations also helps expand local capacity to properly evaluate implementation and impact 

and determine whether educational interventions are effective. In addition, the program garners 

significant non-Federal interest in supporting innovation in education; to date, private institutions 

have made commitments of almost $150 million to assist in the implementation of grantee 

projects. 

The i3 program continues to experience significant demand across the Nation. In 2012, the 

Department received over 700 applications for projects to validate or scale up proven practices 

and pre-applications for projects to develop and test promising practices. The funding 

requested for 2014 would allow the Department to continue to build on this success in fostering 

educational innovation while developing an evidence base in areas of high need and generating 

private-sector investment to complement the Federal investment. 

The Department is considering priorities for the 2014 grant competition. The priorities under 

consideration include funding for projects that propose to improve early learning outcomes; 

improve student attainment in science, technology, engineering, and science (STEM) subjects; 

and improve productivity. 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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For fiscal year 2014, the Department would reserve $10.8 million for national activities, including 

providing technical assistance to help grantees develop evaluation plans, among other 

activities. The Department is considering using up to $10 million to carry out “pay-for-success” 

projects to incentivize service providers to achieve better results in a cost-effective manner that 

ensures that public funds are used efficiently. In addition the Department would reserve 

$64.5 million for ARPA-ED. ARPA-ED would be a new entity within the Department modeled 

after similar agencies in the Department of Defense and Department of Energy. Its mission 

would be to pursue development of educational technology and tools that result in 

improvements for all students (especially those from low-income backgrounds) by increasing 

educational achievement and attainment for students in both traditional and non-traditional 

learning environments. Funds for ARPA-ED would need to be appropriated on a no-year basis 

to remain available for obligation until expended.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Amount for new awards $142,762 $140,452 $137,600

Number of new awards 20 17-23 15-20

Range of awards $1,975- 14,954 $1,000- 20,000 $1,000- 20,000

Peer review of new award 

applications

$991 $1,494 $2,150

National activities $5,664 $7,471 $ 10,750

ARPA-ED 0 0 $64,500

________________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

This section presents selected program information, including, for example, GPRA goals, 

objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the progress 

made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on the 

cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years, and in FY 2014 and future years, 

as well as the resources and efforts invested by those served by this program.

Goal: To improve educational outcomes for students by developing, identifying, and 

scaling up effective practices that are demonstrated to have an impact on student 

achievement and other student outcomes.

Objective: To validate and scale effective solutions to persistent educational challenges across 

the country to serve a substantially larger numbers of students.
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Measure: The percentage of Scale-up grantees that reached their annual target of students.

Year Target Actual

2011 67

2012 70

2013 75

2014 80

Measure: The percentage of Validation grantees that reached their annual target of students.

Year Target Actual

2011 46

2012 50

2013 54

2014 60

Additional information: The source of the data is annual grantee performance reports. Data 

reported are from the first cohort of i3 grantees and represent grantee performance from 

October 1, 2010 through September 30, 2011. This is the first set of performance reports 

submitted by grantees since the program was first funded, and the Department will continue 

providing technical assistance to grantees in order to improve the quality, completeness, and 

consistency of the data. Actual data are based on partial data, as not every grantee provided 

targets for the number of students that would be served nor did grantees report student data 

consistently. Data for fiscal year 2012 will be available in late 2013. 

Objective: To promote rigorous evaluation of i3 funded projects that will generate significant 

new information about the effectiveness of diverse strategies, practices, and products that 

address persistent educational challenges.

Measure: The percentage of programs, practices, or strategies supported by a Scale-up 

grant with ongoing well-designed and independent evaluations that will provide evidence of 

their effectiveness at improving student outcomes.

Year Target Actual

2011 100

2012 80

2013 80

2014 80
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Measure: The percentage of programs, practices, or strategies supported by a Validation grant 

with ongoing well-designed and independent evaluations that will provide evidence of their 

effectiveness at improving student outcomes.

Year Target Actual

2011 100

2012 90

2013 92

2014 94

Measure: The percentage of programs, practices, or strategies supported by a Development 

grant with ongoing evaluations that provide evidence of their promise for improving student 

outcomes.

Year Target Actual

2011 97

2012 94

2013 95

2014 96

Additional information: The source of the data is annual grantee performance reports. Data 

reported are from the first cohort of i3 grantees and represent grantee performance from 

October 1, 2010 through September 30, 2011. The Department will continue providing technical 

assistance to grantees in order to improve the quality, completeness, and consistency of the 

data. Data for fiscal year 2012 will be available in late 2013. 

Assessment of evaluation design and efficacy is based on reviews by external reviewers trained 

in the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) standards. A well-designed study is one that would 

meet the WWC standards, with or without reservations, if it were also well-implemented. An 

independent evaluation means that the evaluation is being conducted by an organization that is 

not responsible for project development and implementation. To qualify as providing evidence of 

effectiveness at improving student outcomes, a study must estimate the impact of the program, 

practice, or strategy on one or more of the student outcomes specified in the intervention’s logic 

model and that meet WWC Outcome Standards in terms of face validity, alignment, reliability,

and validity. Although the evaluation plans for all 4 Scale-Up grantees and all 15 Validation 

grantees currently meet these standards, the program l may not be able to maintain these first 

year results throughout the end of each project. For example, differences in attrition among 

students in treatment and control groups could pose a significant challenge to the design of a 

project evaluation. Furthermore, given the small number of projects in the Scale-Up grant 

category, problems in one project would dramatically change the percentage of projects meeting 

the measure. 

For Development grants, determinations of evidence of promise were based on whether project 

evaluations used research designs that would provide a comparison for the outcomes of the 

intervention group.
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Measure: The percentage of programs, practices, or strategies supported by a Scale-Up grant 

with ongoing evaluations that are providing high-quality implementation data and performance

feedback that allow for periodic assessment of progress toward achieving intended outcomes.

Year Target Actual

2011 100

2012 80

2013 80

2014 80

Measure: The percentage of programs, practices, or strategies supported by a Validation grant 

with ongoing evaluations that are providing high-quality implementation data and performance 

feedback that allow for periodic assessment of progress toward achieving intended outcomes.

Year Target Actual

2011 93

2012 90

2013 90

2014 90

Measure: The percentage of programs, practices, or strategies supported by a Development 

grant with ongoing evaluations that are providing high-quality implementation data and 

performance feedback that allow for periodic assessment of progress toward achieving intended 

outcomes.

Year Target Actual

2011 90

2012 90

2013 90

2014 90

Additional information: The source of the data is annual grantee performance reports. Data 

reported are from the first cohort of i3 grantees and represent grantee performance from 

October 1, 2010 through September 30, 2011. The Department will continue providing technical 

assistance to grantees in order to improve the quality, completeness, and consistency of the 

data. Data for fiscal year 2012 will be available in late 2013. 

Although the Department’s evaluation contractor worked with the i3 grantees and evaluators to 

develop logic models and fidelity measures of program implementation, it is unlikely that initial 

program results will be maintained throughout the life of all of the projects. Slight programmatic 

changes could affect the quality of program implementation data. The Department is providing

technical assistance to grantees and their evaluators on this issue.

Note that at this time the Department is not reporting data separately on the percentage of 

Development grantees that are implementing their projects with fidelity to the approved design. 

However, the evaluation contractor, in determining which Development projects to count as 
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meeting the elements of the last measure above (the percentage of programs, practices, or 

strategies supported by a Development grant with ongoing evaluations that are providing highquality implementation data and performance feedback that allow for periodic assessment of 

progress toward achieving intended outcomes), examines whether Development projects’

evaluation plans include a strategy for measuring implementation fidelity.

Efficiency Measures

The Department has established cost per student as the efficiency measure for the i3 program. 

Data for this measure are based on aggregate total project costs and the number of students 

served by all grantees. Aggregate program costs were used to calculate costs per student due

to inconsistencies in the data grantees reported. The Department is developing a new annual 

reporting format and providing technical assistance to grantees in order to improve the quality, 

completeness, and consistency of the data. Data for fiscal year 2012 will be available in late 

2013. In the future, the Department expects to be able to provide data for this measure based 

on both total aggregate program costs and program costs minus evaluation costs. Being able to 

disaggregate evaluation costs is critical because evaluation costs for i3 projects tend to be large 

due to the goal of meeting WWC standards.

Year Cost per student, 

Scale-Up grants

Cost per student, 

Validation grants

Cost per student, 

Development grants

2011 $53 $177 $140

2012

2013

2014
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STEM Innovation:

STEM innovation networks

(Proposed legislation)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined

Budget Authority:

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

STEM Innovation Networks 0 0 $150,000 +$150,000

STEM Teacher Pathways 0 0 80,000 +80,000

STEM Master Teacher Corps 0 0 35,000 +35,000

Subtotal, STEM Innovation 

Networks 0 0 265,000 +265,000

Effective teaching and 

learning: STEM 0 0 149,716 +149,716

Total 0 0 414,716 +414,716

PROGRAM OVERVIEW

Scientists and engineers create many of the innovations that drive our nation’s global 

competitiveness. Our nation’s capacity to create and innovate must never be limited by a 

shortage of talent in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. To 

prepare our students for STEM jobs and other high-skill careers, we must provide them with 

meaningful opportunities to develop knowledge and competencies in these subjects. 

Federal agencies have developed a range of STEM education programs over the years in order 

to meet this need, but with limited success. In the absence of a single guiding plan, these 

efforts have proliferated to include over 220 programs across 13 different agencies at an annual 

Federal investment of almost $3 billion. Many of these initiatives are not effectively aligned 

either to the needs of students or to national priorities, and this fragmented approach to 

investment has made it difficult to reform and improve Federal STEM education efforts.

The Administration is proposing a comprehensive reorganization of STEM education programs 

to support a cohesive national STEM education strategy and to increase the impact of Federal 

investments in four areas: pre-kindergarten-through-grade-twelve (pre-K-12) instruction; 

undergraduate education; graduate fellowships; and informal education activities. The 

reorganization involves consolidating or restructuring 90 programs across 11 agencies and 

improving the delivery, impact, and visibility of STEM education efforts. 
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The proposed STEM Innovation initiative is a central element of the Administration’s efforts to 

ensure that our Nation’s children are prepared to succeed in a global economy increasingly 

reliant on STEM knowledge and skills. The programs included in this initiative are designed to 

help achieve that goal by: (1) developing, validating, and scaling up effective practices in pre-K12 STEM instruction; (2) increasing student engagement in STEM subjects; and (3) recruiting, 

preparing, and further developing highly effective STEM educators.

The STEM Innovation initiative is comprised of the following complementary authorities: 

(1) STEM Innovation Networks, (2) STEM Teacher Pathways, (3) the STEM Master Teacher 

Corps, and (4) Effective Teaching and Learning: STEM. 

STEM Innovation Networks

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The proposed STEM Innovation Networks (STEM-INs) program would provide competitive 

grants to local educational agencies (LEAs) or consortia of LEAs, in partnership with institutions 

of higher education (IHEs), nonprofit organizations, other public agencies, museums, and 

businesses, to transform STEM teaching and learning, especially for high-need students, and 

accelerate adoption of practices in pre-K-12 education that help increase the number of 

students who seek out and are effectively prepared for postsecondary education and careers in 

STEM fields. 

 

STEM-INs would connect schools, educators, students, and community partners to local, 

regional, and national resources to enhance STEM education. Eligible partnerships would 

develop comprehensive plans for identifying, developing, testing, and spreading the use of 

evidence-based practices that provide students with rich STEM learning opportunities, including 

rigorous programs of STEM study that involve inquiry-, project-, and work-based learning; 

opportunities to interact with, learn from, and be inspired by STEM professionals and experts; 

and advanced coursework, including dual enrollment and other options for earning credit toward 

a postsecondary certificate or degree.

Depending on local needs and the resources available through partnerships with business, 

research organizations, and IHEs, grantees would focus their projects on areas such as: 

(1) recruitment, preparation, placement, and development of effective STEM educators; 

(2) teaching and learning models that enable students to successfully meet STEM-focused 

college- and career-ready standards; and (3) meaningful out-of-school experiences designed to 

increase student engagement in STEM. 

To support effective implementation of these plans, STEM-INs would employ a wide range of 

strategies and utilize a rich array of resources and assets, including using technology to 

promote the broad adoption of effective STEM innovations and instructional technologies and 

leveraging regional and national STEM resources and assets as well as those of federal 

agencies. Other key elements of STEM-INs could include STEM Platform Schools, a subset of 

participating schools that would serve as “test beds” for intensive experimentation, research, 

and innovation in STEM topics relevant to local needs; research and evaluation partnerships to 
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measure the impact of STEM-IN activities and build an evidence base for effective practices that 

would be broadly disseminated; and partnerships with teacher preparation and professional 

development providers to help align pre-service and in-service teacher training with network 

goals. STEM-INs could also engage with existing networks at the State and local levels and 

build on lessons learned to increase student engagement and achievement in STEM. 

To be eligible to receive a grant, an applicant would be required to implement a set of highquality pre-K-12 standards in mathematics and science that build toward college- and careerreadiness; offer a rigorous 4-year course of study in high school science and mathematics; and 

have data systems that support timely collection and analysis of project implementation and 

impact data, including data on student outcomes such as accumulation of postsecondary credits 

in STEM subjects. Grantees would initially receive funding for 3 years and could receive an 

additional 2 years of funding if meeting performance expectations.

STEM Innovation Networks grants would be rigorously evaluated, with each grantee required to 

partner with a research institution for short- and long-term evaluative studies and to participate 

in a Department-funded program evaluation. The Department would be authorized to reserve up 

to 5 percent of program funds to support a range of national activities, including technical 

assistance, data collection, evaluation, and dissemination. 

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $150 million in fiscal year 2014 to initiate the STEM Innovation 

Networks program as part of a government-wide consolidation of smaller, fragmented STEM 

activities that is intended to transform STEM teaching and learning using a coherent approach 

aligned to meaningful priorities. STEM-INs would help organize LEAs to share best practices, 

identify common problems that can be addressed through research and innovation programs, 

and support a rapid scale-up of effective STEM instructional models throughout the Nation.

Improving American students’ engagement and achievement in STEM fields is vital to ensuring 

the continued economic well-being of our country and is a priority of the Administration. In a 

2005 report, Rising Above the Gathering Storm, the National Academies concluded that a 

primary factor influencing the future health of the American economy and our ability to create 

jobs is innovation resulting from advances in science and engineering. In addition, recent 

projections from the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics indicate that over 

80 percent of the fastest-growing occupations (such as those in healthcare- and computerrelated fields) require knowledge of STEM subjects. Yet US students finished 17th out of 33 

countries in mathematics and 12th out of 33 countries in science on the 2009 Program for 

International Student Assessment (PISA), which measures the mathematics and science 

literacy of 15-year-olds in the world’s most advanced countries. For the United States to build 

and maintain the highly skilled workforce and nourish the technological innovation needed to 

remain competitive in the global economy, we must improve STEM teaching and learning and 

ensure access to rigorous courses of study for our students.
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The STEM Innovation Networks program builds on models already being developed and 

implemented in States and school districts with a strong STEM focus, including those using 

funding through Race to the Top. Ohio launched the first statewide STEM Learning Network in 

2007, including several successful STEM schools and an intensive partnership structure that 

has now expanded to engage 15 additional States in STEM education reform. STEM schools 

have also adopted a network approach, such as the Harmony Science Academy schools in 

Texas or the New Tech Network that currently operates in 18 States. These networks have 

demonstrated improvements in student engagement and achievement in STEM and promoted 

effective teaching practices. The STEM Innovation Networks proposal is designed to build on 

and scale up these early successes by fostering new systems of support and expanding the 

evidence base for effective practices in STEM teaching and learning.

STEM Virtual Learning Network

In fiscal year 2014, the Department would use STEM Innovation Networks national activities 

funds to develop a STEM Virtual Learning Network, an online community based on the 

Department’s Connected Educator and Learning Registry initiatives and designed both to 

facilitate interaction among STEM educators and to accelerate identification, dissemination, 

adoption, and use of effective practices. The Department would leverage the work of STEM 

Innovation Networks grantees by requiring them to contribute actively to this community. 

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands) 

Measures

2014

Amount for new awards $141,750

Peer review of new award applications $750

National activities, including STEM Virtual Learning Network $7,500

Total, STEM Innovation Networks $150,000

STEM Teacher Pathways

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

STEM Teacher Pathways would directly support the President’s goal of developing 

100,000 new effective and highly effective STEM teachers while also building evidence on the 

characteristics and requirements of high-quality STEM teacher preparation programs.

This competition would provide grant awards to create or expand high-quality pathways to 

teacher certification and other innovative approaches for recruiting, training, and placing 

talented recent college graduates and mid-career professionals in STEM fields in high-need 
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schools. Traditional and nontraditional teacher preparation programs, including alternative 

routes to certification, would be eligible to compete for funding, and the Department would look 

at ways to leverage and integrate the Pathways program with the work of the STEM Innovation 

Networks (STEM-INs). For example, the Department could give priority to STEM Teacher 

Pathways applicants that propose partnerships with schools and districts served by STEM-INs. 

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The $80 million request for STEM Teacher Pathways would help high-need schools and areas

address a critical need for effective STEM teachers. Public high schools, in particular, report 

greater difficulties in filling STEM teaching positions, such as mathematics, biology, and 

physical sciences, than other subjects, such as English and social studies. Moreover, public 

high schools report that higher proportions of individuals teaching mathematics and science lack 

an undergraduate major or certification in their field when compared to teachers of other 

subjects, such as English or history.

This program’s emphasis on STEM teacher preparation and retention reflects the Department’s 

commitment to promoting excellence in STEM throughout our education system, and would 

complement the other proposed STEM programs. For example, while the STEM-INs could 

include pre-service teacher preparation as part of a region’s overall comprehensive approach to 

improving STEM teaching and learning, STEM Teacher Pathways would focus more specifically 

on the recruitment, selection, preparation, and induction support of new, effective and highly 

effective STEM teachers.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2014

Amount for new awards $75,200

Peer review of new award applications $800

National activities $4,000

Total, STEM Teacher Pathways $80,000
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STEM Master Teacher Corps

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

In July 2012, the Administration proposed the creation of a national STEM Master Teacher 

Corps comprised of some of the nation’s finest educators in STEM subjects. Selected teachers 

would make a multi-year commitment to the Corps and, in exchange for their expertise, 

leadership and service, receive an annual stipend on top of their base salary. 

The STEM Master Teacher Corps may also involve collaboration with nonprofit organizations 

and local public-private partnerships between STEM-related businesses and industries and 

school districts. Members of the Corps would be selected through a rigorous recruitment and 

selection process based on teachers’ demonstrated effectiveness in teaching one or more 

STEM subjects, content knowledge, and contributions to the continuous improvement of 

teaching and learning both within their schools and across the community of STEM educators. 

Key goals would include recognizing, retaining, and rewarding expert STEM teachers while 

elevating the STEM teaching profession. Corps members would be a national resource, and 

would have an ongoing commitment to professional learning, building a community of practice, 

and helping students excel in STEM subjects while taking on leadership and mentorship roles in 

their schools and communities.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $35.0 million to support a pilot project for the STEM Master 

Teacher Corps in fiscal year 2014. The STEM Master Teacher Corps is a key recommendation 

of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and is designed to recognize 

and help retain the Nation’s most talented STEM teachers, build a community of practice among 

them, provide leadership opportunities for those teachers to help transform STEM teaching and 

learning, and raise the profile of the STEM teaching profession.

The proposed pilot project would, among other things, establish guidelines for Corps member 

recruitment, selection and integration into existing reforms, and define Corps members’ roles, 

emphasizing their contribution to improving STEM teaching and learning across the country.

The STEM Master Teacher Corps would complement the other programs within the STEM 

Innovation initiative to support highly effective STEM teachers. In particular, Corps members 

could take on leadership roles in developing and implementing the STEM Innovation Networks 

(STEM-INs), validate and promote practices to improve STEM teaching and learning in Platform 

schools and across regional areas through the STEM-INs, work with a range of Federal STEM 

resources to enrich the efforts of the STEM-INs, and contribute to the Virtual Learning Network. 

The STEM Master Teacher Corps also could contribute to the design and support of STEM 

Teacher Pathways projects and to the effective implementation of Teacher and Leader 

Innovation Fund grants.
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2014

Amount for new awards $32,900

Peer review of new award applications $350

National activities $1,750

Total, STEM Master Teacher Corps $35,000

Effective teaching and learning: STEM

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Effective Teaching and Learning: STEM program, proposed as part of the Administration’s 

Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) reauthorization plan in 2010, would reform 

the Mathematics and Science Partnerships program under current law and provide grants to 

SEAs, alone or in partnership with other entities, to support State and local efforts to implement 

a comprehensive strategy for the provision of high-quality pre-K-12 STEM instruction. Grantees 

and subgrantees would be required to focus on improving teaching and learning in mathematics 

or science, or both, and could also carry out activities designed to increase student achievement

in technology or engineering, in high-need LEAs and schools.

In light of the Administration’s bold new STEM education program reorganization, the 

Administration is revising its Effective Teaching and Learning: STEM proposal to complement 

the proposed STEM Innovation Networks. The Effective Teaching and Learning: STEM 

program would retain the formula grant structure of Mathematics and Science Partnerships but 

improve the awarding and use of subgrants under current law to align with the Administration’s 

STEM education goals. This would allow all States to invest in STEM education while targeting 

support to the development and implementation of evidence-based STEM education programs. 

Further, improvements in STEM education supported with Effective Teaching and Learning: 

STEM grants could be leveraged by the STEM Innovation Networks and further disseminated 

through the STEM Virtual Learning Network.

States would be permitted to reserve up to 20 percent of grant funds for State-level activities to 

support the development and implementation of a coherent statewide approach to providing 

high-quality, evidence-based STEM instruction in high-need schools. States would be required 

to use remaining funds to make subgrants to high-need LEAs and eligible partnerships for 

efforts to improve STEM instruction at the local level that include effective professional 

development of teachers and school leaders; high-quality curricula, instructional materials, and 

assessment systems aligned with State standards; and continuous monitoring of project 

implementation and outcomes. Subgrantees also would be permitted to use funds for activities 

that integrate STEM instruction into teaching of other core academic subjects, improve 
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engagement in STEM, and use technology to support teaching and learning. In making 

subgrants, States would be required to give priority to eligible entities that propose projects

supported by the strongest available evidence.

The Department would be authorized to reserve up to 10 percent of program funds to support a 

range of national activities, including identification of effective programs and best practices, 

development of high-quality educational and professional development content, technical 

assistance, and dissemination. The Department would also be permitted to reserve up to 

5 percent of funds for competitive grants to strengthen States capacity to improve the teaching 

and learning of STEM subjects.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $149.7 million in fiscal year 2014 for the proposed Effective 

Teaching and Learning: STEM program, the same as the fiscal year 2012 level for Mathematics 

and Science Partnerships. This request would support the first year of the program, which 

would replace Mathematics and Science Partnerships with a more comprehensive, flexible 

authority under a reauthorized ESEA and would address the need to strengthen instruction 

comprehensively and increase student achievement in STEM subjects in high-need LEAs and 

schools.

Improving achievement in STEM fields is imperative for maintaining our Nation’s economic 

security. Moreover, we must redouble our efforts to ensure that high-need students have 

access to rigorous, high-quality programs of STEM instruction. While a 2007 report from the 

Department’s National Center for Education Statistics, Advanced Mathematics and Science 

Coursetaking in the Spring High School Senior Classes of 1982, 1992, and 2004, indicates that 

high school graduates’ completion of mathematics and science courses increased between 

1982 and 2004 and that greater percentages of graduates took advanced mathematics and 

science courses in 2004 compared to 1982, graduates in the highest socioeconomic status 

(SES) quartile were consistently more likely than graduates in the lowest SES quartile to have 

completed advanced-level coursework in mathematics and science. In addition, as reported in 

the Department’s Condition of Education 2012, the percentages of White and Asian/Pacific 

Islander high school graduates who completed advanced science and mathematics coursework 

between 1990 and 2009 were consistently higher than those of their Black and Hispanic peers. 

Effective Teaching and Learning: STEM would help address these concerns by focusing on 

teaching and learning of STEM subjects in a manner that is aligned with college- and careerready standards and targeted to high-need LEAs serving large concentrations of poor and 

minority students. 

If Congress does not reauthorize the ESEA prior to enactment of fiscal year 2014 

appropriations, the Administration will request authority through appropriations language to 

improve the awarding and use of subgrants under Mathematics and Science Partnerships (while 

retaining the program’s formula grant structure) to align with the evidence-based STEM 

Innovation Networks proposal.
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures

2014

Amount for new awards $134,244

Peer review of new award applications $500

National activities $14,972

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

The Department will establish goals and performance indicators to assess the impact of the 

STEM Innovation programs.
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Mathematics and science partnerships

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title II, Part B)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: 01

Budget Authority:

2012 2013 2014

Change 

from 2012

$149,716 $149,716 2 0 -$149,716

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. The Administration proposes to consolidate the program in 

FY 2014 under new legislation. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Mathematics and Science Partnerships (MSP) program supports State and local efforts to 

improve students’ academic achievement in mathematics and science by improving elementary 

and secondary school mathematics and science teacher education and professional 

development. Authorized program activities include summer workshops or institutes that train 

teachers to use curricula that are based on scientific research and aligned with challenging 

State academic content standards; innovative distance-learning programs; and programs that 

bring teachers together with working scientists, mathematicians, and engineers to expand 

teachers’ subject-matter knowledge and research. Grantees may also use program funds to 

develop more rigorous mathematics and science curricula that are aligned with challenging 

State and local academic content standards and to recruit individuals with mathematics, 

science, and engineering majors into the teaching profession through the use of signing and 

performance incentives, stipends, and scholarships. 

The Department provides grants to States by formula based on the number of children ages 5 to 

17 who are from families with incomes below the poverty line, with no State receiving less than 

0.5 percent of the appropriation; States then award funds competitively to eligible partnerships. 

Eligible partnerships must include an engineering, mathematics, or science department of an 

institution of higher education (IHE) and a high-need local educational agency (LEA). 

Partnerships may also include other engineering, mathematics, science, or teacher training 

departments of an IHE; additional LEAs and public or private elementary or secondary schools, 

including charter schools; businesses; and nonprofit or for-profit organizations with 

demonstrated effectiveness in improving the quality of mathematics and science teachers.

In fiscal year 2013, the Department intends to develop regulations to help ensure that MSPfunded partnerships implement projects on a schoolwide basis (and not only for a handful of 
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teachers in a school, resulting in uneven within-school impact too often seen under the current

program structure) and have the commitment of school administrators.

The MSP program is a forward-funded program. Funds become available for obligation on 

July 1 of the fiscal year in which the funds are appropriated and remain available for 15 months 

through September 30 of the following year.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009 ....................................................................$178,978

2010 ......................................................................180,478

2011 ......................................................................175,127

2012 ......................................................................149,716 

2013 ......................................................................149,7161

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST 

The Administration is not requesting fiscal year 2014 funding for the Mathematics and Science 

Partnerships program. In place of this program, the Administration has proposed to create, 

through the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization, a new program, Effective 

Teaching and Learning: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). This 

program would provide competitive grants to SEAs (alone or in partnership with appropriate 

outside entities) to support State and local efforts to implement a comprehensive strategy for the 

provision of high-quality STEM instruction and support to students from prekindergarten through 

grade 12. Grantees and subgrantees would be required to focus on mathematics or science, or 

both, and could also carry out activities in technology or engineering.

In awarding grants, the Department would give priority to SEAs that have adopted and are 

implementing a set of high-quality K-12 standards in at least mathematics that build toward 

college- and career-readiness and are common to a significant number of States. States would 

be permitted to reserve up to 20 percent of grant funds for State-level activities to support the 

development and implementation of a coherent statewide approach to providing high-quality 

evidence-based STEM instruction in high-need schools. States would be required to use their 

remaining grant funds to make subgrants to high-need LEAs and eligible partnerships for efforts 

to improve STEM instruction at the local level that include effective professional development of 

teachers and school leaders; high-quality curricula, instructional materials, and assessment 

systems aligned with State standards; and continuous monitoring of project implementation and 

outcomes.

If the Congress does not reauthorize the ESEA prior to enactment of fiscal year 2014 

appropriations, the Administration will request authority through appropriations language to 

improve the awarding and use of subgrants under Mathematics and Science Partnerships (while 
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retaining the program’s formula grant structure) to align with the evidence-based STEM 

Innovation Networks proposal and to use up to 5 percent of the appropriation for national 

activities, including technical assistance, evaluation, and dissemination.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Amount for State grants $148,968 $148,968 0

Average State award 2,660 2,660 0

Range of State awards 745-17,876 745–17,876 0

Evaluation 748 748 0

_________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 

progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years as well as the resources and 

efforts invested by those served by this program.

Data for these measures for 2012 will be available in the summer of 2013. No targets are 

shown for 2014 because the program is proposed for consolidation.

Goal: To improve the quality of mathematics and science teachers and increase both the 

number of highly qualified mathematics and science teachers and the achievement of 

students participating in Mathematics and Science Partnerships programs.

Objective: Demonstrate the effectiveness of professional development activities for 

Mathematics and Science Partnerships teachers through increased achievement on 

assessments of mathematics and science content knowledge.
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Measure: The percentage of Mathematics and Science Partnerships teachers who significantly 

increase their content knowledge, as reflected on project-level pre- and post-assessments.

Year Target Actual

2009 71 70

2010 66 66

2011 65 69

2012 65

2013 65

Additional Information: Beginning in 2008, more grantees began using rigorous, nationally 

normed assessments to measure the content knowledge of participating teachers. Because we 

expect more subgrantees to use these assessments, which are often more stringent than 

assessments previously used, the Department has made downward adjustments to the targets 

for this measure for subsequent years, using 2008 data as the baseline. In addition, the 

Department now calculates teacher test score gains on behalf of grantees, thereby eliminating 

grantee reporting error.

Data for this measure are provided only for teachers who completed pre- and postassessments. In the following table are background data for this measure. The decreases in 

the number of participating teachers (in mathematics and in science) as shown in this table 

might be due, among other things, to States’ funding fewer, more intensive subgrant projects.

Year

Number of 

participating 

teachers –

mathematics 

Number of 

participating 

teachers with 

pre- and postassessments –

mathematics

Number of 

participating 

teachers –

science

Number of 

participating 

teachers with 

pre- and postassessments –

science

2009 36,546 15,567 31,762 15,041

2010 31,512 13,391 23,310 10,949

2011 25,344 13,410 19,562 11,735

Objective: Increase the percentage of students in classrooms of Mathematics and Science 

Partnerships teachers who score at the basic level or above on State assessments of 

mathematics and science.
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Measure: The percentage of students in classrooms of Mathematics and Science Partnerships 

teachers who score at the proficient level or above in State assessments of mathematics or 

science.

Year Target Actual

2009 46 58

2010 48 64

2011 50 66

2012 52

2013 54

Additional Information: Student assessment data are available only for subjects and grades 

that are tested using a statewide assessment. In the table below are background data for this 

measure.

Year

Number of 

students taught 

by participating 

teachers –

mathematics

Number of 

students taught 

by participating 

teachers with 

student 

assessment data 

– mathematics

Number of 

students taught 

by participating 

teachers –

science

Number of 

students taught 

by participating 

teachers with 

student 

assessment data 

– science

2009 1,442,254 623,950 1,252,853 325,586

2010 1,476,835 752,225 1,157,168 380,647

2011 1,280,438 824,388 903,788 354,150

Objective: Increase the percentage of Mathematics and Science Partnerships projects that use 

an experimental or quasi-experimental design for their evaluations, that conduct their 

evaluations successfully, and whose evaluations yield scientifically valid results.

Measure: The percentage of Mathematics and Science Partnerships projects that report using 

an experimental or quasi-experimental design for their evaluations.

Year Target Actual

2009 39 52

2010 40 51

2011 41 47

2012 42

2013 43
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Measure: The percentage of Mathematics and Science Partnerships projects that use an 

experimental or quasi-experimental evaluation design that is conducted successfully and yields 

scientifically valid results.

Additional Information: The Department’s contractor collects information related to evaluation 

from annual performance reports and assesses evaluation designs using a rubric that was 

developed for the Department in 2007 and revised in 2011 and 2012 to better align with What 

Works Clearinghouse evidence standards. Included in this measure are only evaluation 

designs for which sufficient information is provided to enable an assessment. We believe that 

conveying high expectations for project evaluation through the rubric and prominently featuring 

subgrantees with strong evaluation designs in technical assistance and dissemination activities 

have contributed to the increase in the percentage of evaluations that are conducted 

successfully and with rigor.

Efficiency Measure

Measure: The percentage of State educational agencies that submit complete and accurate 

data on program performance measures in a timely manner.

Year Target Actual

2009 100 100

2010 100 100

2011 100 100

2012 100

2013 100

Additional Information: To help ensure accuracy, the Department requires State program 

coordinators to review the data before they are submitted to the Department.

Year Target Actual

2009 14 6

2010 15 13

2011 16 24

2012 17

2013 18
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High school redesign

(Proposed legislation)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change

From 2012

0 0 $300,000 +$300,000

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The proposed High School Redesign program would promote the whole school redesign of the 

high school experience in order to provide students with challenging and relevant academic and 

career-related learning experiences that prepare them for postsecondary education and 

careers. Grantee activities would include (1) redesigning academic content and instructional 

practices to align with postsecondary education and careers; (2) providing personalized learning 

opportunities and academic and wrap-around support services; (3) providing high-quality career 

and college exploration and counseling services; (4) offering opportunities to earn 

postsecondary credit while still in high school; (5) offering career-related experiences;

(6) offering project-based learning; (7) making more strategic use of learning time, which could 

include effective application of technology, redesigning school calendars, and competencybased progression; and (8) providing evidence-based professional development to educators. 

Funds would support competitive grants to local educational agencies (LEAs) in partnership with 

(1) institutions of higher education and (2) entities such as non-profits, community-based 

organizations, government agencies, and business or industry-related organizations that can 

help schools prepare students to apply academic concepts to real world challenges. Grantees 

would also be required to leverage existing Federal, State, and local resources to implement 

their projects. Special consideration would be given to partnerships that propose projects that 

are located in areas with limited access to quality career and college opportunities such as highpoverty or rural LEAs. Special consideration would also be given to partnerships with 

employers that provide students at participating schools with career-related experience or help 

students attain career-related credentials.

Under our proposal the Department would set aside one-half of 1 percent of the total 

appropriation for the Bureau of Indian Education for activities consistent with the purposes of the 

program. The Department would also reserve up to 2.5 percent of the appropriated funds for 

national activities, including research, development, demonstration, dissemination, technical 

assistance, and evaluation.
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FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

For fiscal year 2014, the Department requests $300 million for a new High School Redesign

program to promote the whole school redesign of high schools through competitive grants to 

consortia of LEAs and partners so that students graduate from high school with the academic 

foundation and career-related skills they need to be successful. These models will ensure that 

all students in these high schools participate in project- or problem-based learning and 

performance assessments and graduate with:

• College credit, earned through dual enrollment, Advanced Placement courses, or 

other postsecondary learning opportunities; and 

• Career-related experiences or competencies, obtained through organized internships 

and mentorships, structured work-based learning, and other related experiences.

Accomplishing these goals will help improve longer term outcomes for high school students, 

including increased high school graduation rates, high rates of enrollment in postsecondary 

studies without the need to take remedial courses, higher postsecondary completion rates, and 

higher rates of completion of industry-recognized credentials and certifications. Graduates also 

are more likely to enjoy higher rates of employment and command higher salaries due to their 

stronger college preparation and skills development.

Improving American high schools is a critical step for ensuring that America remains competitive 

in today’s global economy. Today’s high school students are tomorrow’s engineers, 

entrepreneurs, and civic leaders who must be critical thinkers and able to find solutions to 

complex and emerging challenges. High schools must provide them with a rigorous and 

relevant education that prepares them to meet the demands of college and careers. 

Yet many of America’s students are not meaningfully engaged or motivated in their academic 

experiences while in high school, and many who graduate lack exposure to the relevant learning 

that bridges their classroom work with future college experiences and careers. In response to 

these concerns, some reformers are trying new program designs for America’s high schools to 

help prepare students for an innovation economy by fostering problem-solving and analytical 

skills; encouraging creativity and collaboration; and equipping students with the knowledge and 

skills needed to be competitive in the workforce. Similarly, the High School Redesign proposal 

responds to evidence that students learn best when they are engaged in complex projects and 

tasks aligned with their interests, and when they work with others through practical examples 

and case studies that keep them engaged in rigorous academic coursework and in the 

application of knowledge.

The Center on Education and the Workforce projects that, by 2018, two-thirds of job openings 

will require some postsecondary education, and about 30 percent of job openings will require at 

least a certificate or associate’s degree. In blue collar occupations, about 35 percent of jobs will 

require some college or more by 2018. Unfortunately, we know that many high school 

graduates are not prepared to succeed in college; according to the National Center for 

Education Statistics (NCES), 20 percent of first-year undergraduate students enrolled in 

institutions of higher education during academic year 2007-08 reported taking remedial courses. 
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The proposed High School Redesign program would seek to address these challenges by 

funding high-quality, innovative high school models that prepare students to be college- and 

career-ready. Funded projects would be expected to incorporate strategies that engage 

students in learning opportunities tied to real world experience (such as work-based learning) 

and also provide students with rigorous, challenging academic content aligned with college-level 

expectations, including programs that allow students to gain postsecondary credit while still in 

high school. These experiences would help students develop not only academic content and 

cognitive competencies (such as critical thinking, solving complex and non-routine problems, 

and evaluating arguments on the basis of evidence) but also pertinent employability skills 

(including interpersonal and intrapersonal competencies, such as conscientiousness and 

persistence) that have been shown to have consistent positive correlations with desirable 

educational and career outcomes (Education for Life and Work: Developing Transferable 

Knowledge and Skills in the 21st Century, NRC, 2012). In addition, projects would be expected 

to incorporate meaningful career exploration opportunities and high-quality college and career 

advisory services to help students plan for the pathway they need to follow to learn the skills 

and attain the credentials they need to enter their chosen careers. 

Grantees would use requested funds to leverage other existing Federal, State, and local funds, 

including through the development of partnerships with business and industry and public or 

private nonprofit and community-based organizations. A key goal of such partnerships would 

be to ensure that career-related activities are aligned with real world expectations, and with 

institutions of higher education, to ensure alignment between secondary and postsecondary 

content and expectations.

The Department would encourage applicants for High School Redesign funding to propose 

projects that connect high school experiences with relevant industry and community partners in 

science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields. The High School Redesign program 

would also complement Administration efforts to reform career and technical education as 

outlined in its 2012 blueprint for reauthorizing the Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, 

which seeks to create stronger links between secondary education, postsecondary education, 

and the employment needs of in-demand industries. The program also expands on 

Administration efforts to improve high school graduation rates and college enrollment rates 

through the College Pathways and Accelerated Learning program proposed under the 

Administration’s proposal for reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act

(ESEA).

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2014

Amount for new awards $288,000

Range of awards $5,000-$25,000

Average award $15,000

Number of new awards 15-25
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Measures 2014

Peer review of new award 

applications $3,000

BIE 1,500

National activities 7,500

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

The Department will establish goals and performance indicators to assess the impact of the 

activities that receive support under this program. The development of these measures would 

build on our experience in creating performance measures for other programs, and the 

Department would also seek to align program measures for High School Redesign with 

measures for related programs.
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Excellent instructional teams

(Proposed legislation)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined

Budget Authority: 

Period of Fund Availability

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

Effective teachers and 

leaders State grants 0 0 $2,466,567 +$2,466,567

Teacher and leader

innovation fund 0 0 400,000 +400,000

Total 0 0 2,866,567 +2,866,567

PROGRAM OVERVIEW

States and local educational agencies (LEAs) are facing new challenges and will require 

significant Federal support in order to promote and enhance the education profession and 

improve teacher and principal effectiveness. The Excellent Instructional Teams programs, 

proposed as part of the Administration’s plan for reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary 

Education Act of 1965 (ESEA), would address those needs by providing funds to foster teacher 

collaboration and the creation of excellent instructional teams through efforts to recruit, prepare, 

support, and retain effective and highly effective teachers, principals, and other school leaders, 

especially in high-need LEAs, schools, fields, and subjects. These programs would also help 

States and LEAs ensure the equitable distribution of effective and highly effective teachers and 

principals across schools.

The Excellent Instructional Teams programs would have two components: Effective Teachers 

and Leaders State Grants, a formula grant program with a 25-percent set-aside, and the 

competitive Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund. Together, these new initiatives would 

provide formula grants to States and districts to improve the effectiveness of teachers and 

school leaders and to support a more equitable distribution of effective and highly effective 

teachers and leaders; investments in the development, improvement and expansion of highquality teacher and leader pathways with evidence of effectiveness; and competitive grants to 

States and districts to support the development and implementation of innovative teacher and 

leader policies. With amounts reserved for evaluation and national activities, the Department 

would build evidence on how best to recruit, prepare, and support effective teachers and school 

leaders, and invest in efforts to enhance the teaching and leadership professions.

This approach would support State and local efforts to: (1) promote and enhance the teaching 

profession; (2) recruit, prepare, develop, reward, and retain effective and highly effective 

teachers, principals, and other school leaders and foster excellent instructional teams, 
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especially in high-need local educational agencies, schools, fields, and subjects; (3) ensure the 

equitable distribution of effective and highly effective teachers and principals; (4) increase the 

effectiveness of teachers and principals; (5) improve the preparation of teachers and principals 

by developing, supporting, and expanding high-performing pathways to becoming a teacher or 

principal; (6) strengthen teacher and principal evaluation systems; (7) ensure that teachers have 

the knowledge, skills, data, support, and collaborative opportunities needed to be effective in the 

classroom; and (8) improve the management of the education workforce in States and local 

educational agencies.

The Administration is also proposing $5 billion in mandatory funding for the Recognizing 

Education Success, Professional Excellence, and Collaborative Teaching (RESPECT) Project. 

The competition would unleash a wave of reform across the country by awarding grants to 

States and consortia of districts with the most ambitious plans and policies for reforming the 

teaching profession. Funds under this initiative would be used to reform teacher and principal 

preparation programs; strengthen teacher and principal evaluation and professional 

development systems; redesign educator career ladders and compensation systems to attract 

and retain top talent; and create conditions in schools that support effective teaching, including 

by providing teachers greater autonomy, shared leadership and responsibility for student 

outcomes, and time for collaboration. This proposal builds on existing reforms initiated through 

Race to the Top, the Teacher Incentive Fund, and ESEA Flexibility.

Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants would be distributed by formula to States based 

35 percent on each State’s relative share of the population aged 5 to 17 and 65 percent on each 

State’s relative share of children aged 5 to 17 from low-income families, consistent with the 

current ESEA Title II, Part A (Improving Teacher Quality State Grants) formula. The 

Department of the Interior/Bureau of Indian Education and the Outlying Areas would each 

receive one-half of 1 percent of the total appropriation. States would use at least 90 percent of 

their formula grants to make subgrants to LEAs.

States could use their State-level funds for a variety of activities, including those designed to 

support the creation of effective teacher career ladders, reform certification and licensure 

requirements, increase the effectiveness of professional development, and reform teacher and 

school leader compensation. States would be required to take steps to strengthen teacher and 

principal evaluation systems within the State, to develop definitions of effective teachers and 

principals, to design and implement plans to ensure that low-income and minority students have 

equitable access to effective teachers and leaders, and to report on the effectiveness of their 

teacher and principal preparation programs, as measured, in part, by the performance of their 

graduates in the classroom. In addition, some State-level funds would be focused on improving 

the effectiveness of the State’s principals.

States would distribute funds to LEAs by formula based 20 percent on each LEA’s relative share 

of the population aged 5 to 17 and 80 percent on each LEA’s relative share of children aged 5 to 
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17 from low-income families, also consistent with the current ESEA Title II, Part A formula. In 

order to receive an award, an LEA would be required to develop and implement high-quality 

teacher and principal evaluation systems that, among other things, differentiate teachers across 

multiple performance levels, based in significant part on student academic growth as well as 

other measures. LEAs would also be required to conduct an assessment of local needs and 

use program funds, along with other local, State, and Federal funds, to meet those needs and to 

ensure the equitable distribution of effective and highly effective teachers and principals within 

the LEA. LEAs would use program funds to carry out a broad range of activities, including those 

designed to recruit, prepare, support, and retain effective and highly effective teachers and 

principals, particularly for high-need and low-performing schools.

The Department would reserve up to 25 percent of the Effective Teachers and Leaders State 

Grants appropriation to make competitive awards for teacher and leader preparation activities. 

Activities funded under the proposed set-aside would play a key role in helping to create or 

expand high-quality pathways into the teaching profession and other innovative approaches for 

recruiting, training, and placing talented recent college graduates and mid-career professionals 

with strong content knowledge in high-need schools. It would support the essential elements of 

preparing new teachers to enter the classroom, supporting them during their first years in the 

profession, and addressing inequities in the distribution of effective and highly effective 

teachers. The proposed set-aside would also support the recruitment, preparation, and 

retention of effective principals and school leadership teams who are able to turn around lowperforming schools.

This would be a forward-funded program. Funds would become available for obligation from 

July 1 of the fiscal year in which they are appropriated and remain available through 

September 30 of the following year.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $2.5 billion for the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants 

program for fiscal year 2014. This program would focus on improving teacher and principal 

effectiveness and ensuring the equitable distribution of effective and highly effective teachers 

and principals. States and LEAs would have flexibility in how they use formula grant funds, but 

would be accountable for improving their teacher and principal evaluation systems and ensuring 

that low-income and minority students have equitable access to teachers and principals who are 

effective at raising student achievement. 

Funding for the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants program would also help ensure 

that all children are taught by teachers who have expertise in the subjects they teach and the 

skills and support needed to be effective. In guiding the implementation of the program, the 

Department would emphasize collaboration among staff, formation of effective instructional 

teams, and the use of student work and outcome data to improve instruction and student 

achievement.

Over the next 10 years, 1.6 million teachers will retire, and 1.6 million new teachers will be 

needed to take their place. This poses both an enormous challenge and an extraordinary 
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H-54

opportunity for our education system; if we succeed in recruiting, preparing, supporting, and 

retaining great teaching talent, we can transform public education in this country and begin to 

deliver an excellent education for every child. A growing body of research also indicates that 

the quality of a school‘s leadership has a substantial effect on student achievement. Effective

school leaders are able to create cultures focused on learning, with high expectations for all 

students, as well as recruit and retain highly effective teachers. Moreover, the impact of strong 

leadership may be greatest in high-need and low-performing schools. These schools need 

serious, systematic change, requiring transformative leaders. Federal investments in the 

recruitment, preparation, and retention of effective principals and school leadership teams will 

also be particularly important given that the Bureau of Labor Statistics expects increased 

demand for educational administrators through 2018, as the number of school-age children 

grows and current school leaders retire in greater numbers.

In recognition of the changing nature of America’s teaching workforce and the need to enhance 

the role of teachers and principals in transforming public education, the Department would use 

the 25-percent set-aside to support:

• The creation and expansion of high-quality pathways into the teaching profession and 

school leadership, including university- and LEA-based traditional and alternative routes into 

teaching, and the recruitment, preparation, and retention of principals and school leadership 

teams that are able to turn around low-performing schools. The Department would also use 

these funds to support the expansion and improvement of teacher preparation programs at 

minority-serving institutions to increase the number of effective minority educators in highneed schools.

• Competitive grants to States and LEAs to dramatically improve the quality of teacher and 

principal preparation, including the development of rigorous accountability systems for 

teacher and principal preparation programs, the enhancement of teacher and principal

certification and licensure standards so that those standards are based on performance, and 

the development and improvement of teacher and principal evaluation systems.

• The new Supporting Effective Educator Development (SEED) program, which was initiated 

with fiscal year 2011 funds under the current Improving Teacher Quality State Grants 

program. Under the SEED program, the Department makes grants to national nonprofit 

organizations to support teacher and school leader enhancement projects with evidence of 

effectiveness.

• National research, technical assistance, outreach, and dissemination activities. The 

Department would support activities to strengthen teacher and principal evaluation, improve 

teacher and principal certification, develop and disseminate model surveys on the quality of 

educator support and working conditions, and scale up the work of nonprofit organizations 

that support LEAs in strengthening their teacher and principal pipelines and human resource 

practices.

The Department would reserve up to an additional 1.5 percent for evaluation. In fiscal year 

2014, continuation costs for the Transition to Teaching program would be funded from the 

Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants set-aside for national leadership activities.
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2014

Funding for State grants(SGs) $1,788,261

SGs Range of awards to States 8,558–201,862

SGs Average State grant 34,390

Amount for Outlying Areas 12,333

Amount for BIE 12,333

National leadership activities 616,642

Evaluation 36,999

_________________

NOTE: In 2014, the Department would use approximately $16,381 thousand from the Effective Teachers and 

Leaders State Grants set-aside to pay continuation costs under the Transition to Teaching program.

Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund would provide support for State and LEA efforts to 

develop and implement innovative approaches to improving human capital management 

systems. It would build on the strengths of the Teacher Incentive Fund and support 

compensation reforms and complementary reforms of teacher and principal development and 

evaluation, teacher placement, and other practices.

Grantees, selected competitively, would use funds to reform teacher and school leader 

compensation and career advancement systems, improve the use of evaluation results for 

retention, compensation, and other human capital management decisions, improve hiring and 

placement practices, improve certification and licensure systems, and implement other 

innovative strategies to strengthen the workforce.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $400 million in 2014, a $100 million increase from the fiscal year 

2012 appropriation for the current Teacher Incentive Fund, for the Teacher and Leader 

Innovation Fund. This program would help States and LEAs improve the effectiveness of 

teachers and leaders in high-need schools and LEAs, in particular by creating the conditions to 

identify, recruit, prepare, support, retain, and advance effective and highly effective teachers, 

teacher leaders, principals, and school leadership teams in those schools. It would also support 

activities to improve teacher and leader effectiveness, reduce disparities in the access of 

students to effective and highly effective teachers and leaders, and support the improvement of 

persistently low-performing schools.
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In fiscal year 2014, continuation costs for the Teacher Incentive Fund would be funded from the 

appropriation for the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2014

Funding for new awards(NAs) $18,000

NAs Number of new awards 2

NAs Average new award $9,000

Peer review of new award applications $1,000

Evaluation $6,000

TIF continuation costs $375,000

_________________

NOTE: In 2014, the Department would use approximately $375,000 thousand from the Teacher and Leader 

Innovation Fund to pay continuation costs under the Teacher Incentive Fund.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

The Department will establish goals and performance indicators to assess the impact of the 

Excellent Instructional Teams programs.

Under the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants program, each State would be required 

to report annually to the public and the Department, through a State Report Card, on key 

measures concerning teacher and principal effectiveness, the quality of educator support and 

working conditions, the distribution of effective and highly effective teachers and principals, and 

the effectiveness of each teacher and principal preparation program in the State.
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Excellent in stru ction al t eams con solid ations:

Improving teacher quality State grants

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title II, Part A)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: 01

Budget Authority: 

Period of Fund Availability 2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

Annual appropriation $785,126 $785,126 0 -$785,126

Advance for succeeding 

fiscal year 1,681,441 1,681,441 0 -1,681,441

Total 2,466,567 2,466,567 2 0 -2,466,567

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. The program is proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 

under new legislation. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

Improving Teacher Quality State Grants provide funds to State educational agencies (SEAs) 

and local educational agencies (LEAs) to develop and support a high-quality teaching force 

through activities that are grounded in scientifically based research. The program gives States 

and LEAs a flexible source of funding with which to meet their particular needs in strengthening 

the skills and knowledge of teachers and principals to enable them to improve student 

achievement in the core academic subjects. In return for this flexibility, LEAs are required to 

demonstrate annual progress in ensuring that all teachers teaching in core academic subjects 

within the State are highly qualified and that increasing numbers of teachers are receiving highquality professional development.

Improving Teacher Quality State Grants funds are distributed by formula. Each State receives 

the amount of funds that it received from the antecedent Eisenhower Professional Development 

State Grants and Class Size Reduction programs in fiscal year 2001, totaling around 

$2.1 billion. Remaining funds (around $300 million) are then allocated to States by formula, with 

35 percent of remaining allocations based on States’ relative shares of the population aged 5 to 

17 and 65 percent based on States’ relative shares of children from low-income families aged 

5 to 17. Each State must receive at least one-half of 1 percent of these remaining funds. The 

Bureau of Indian Education in the Department of the Interior and the Outlying Areas each 

receive one-half of 1 percent of the appropriation.

Each State allocates 95 percent of its funds for subgrants to LEAs, 2.5 percent for subgrants to 

eligible partnerships (or a smaller percentage if the total amount reserved by all States for this 

purpose would exceed $125 million), and the remainder for State-level activities. A State 
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awards subgrants to LEAs using a formula that is similar to the one that the Department uses 

for State allocations, except that, after LEAs receive the amount equivalent to their 2001 

allocations from the Eisenhower Professional Development State Grants and Class Size 

Reduction programs, remaining funds are then allocated to LEAs by a formula based 20 percent 

on LEAs’ share of the population aged 5 to 17 and 80 percent on LEAs’ share of children from 

low-income families aged 5 to 17. In addition to using these funds for professional development 

and class-size reduction, LEAs may use program funds for other activities to improve teacher 

quality, including teacher and principal recruitment and retention initiatives, signing bonuses and 

other financial incentives, teacher and principal mentoring, reforming tenure systems, merit pay, 

teacher testing, and differentiated compensation initiatives.

Subgrants to eligible partnerships are awarded competitively by the State agency for higher 

education working in conjunction with the SEA. Eligible partnerships must include an institution 

of higher education and its division that prepares teachers and principals, a school of arts and 

sciences, and a high-need LEA, and may include other entities. Partnerships that receive a 

subgrant must use the funds to provide professional development in core academic subjects to 

teachers, highly qualified paraprofessionals, and, if appropriate, principals.

States may use their State-level funds for a variety of activities, including the reform of teacher 

and principal certification or licensing requirements, teacher mentoring, creation or improvement 

of alternative routes to certification, teacher recruitment and retention programs, tenure reform, 

professional development for teachers and principals, technical assistance to LEAs, activities to 

promote State reciprocity of teacher and principal certification or licensing, performance-based 

compensation systems, and pay differentiation programs.

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), as reauthorized by the No Child Left 

Behind Act of 2001, required all SEAs receiving Title I, Part A funds to develop a plan to have all 

public school teachers of core academic subjects meet the Act’s definition of a “highly qualified 

teacher” no later than the end of the 2005-2006 school year. “Highly qualified” means that the 

teacher: (1) has obtained full State certification; (2) holds a minimum of a bachelor’s degree; 

and (3) has demonstrated subject-matter competency in each of the academic subjects in which 

he or she teaches.

In the fiscal year 2011 appropriations act, Congress directed the Department to use 1 percent of 

that year’s appropriation for the new Supporting Effective Educator Development (SEED) 

program, and in the fiscal year 2012 appropriations act, Congress increased this set-aside to 

1.5 percent. Under this program, the Department makes grants to national nonprofit 

organizations to support teacher and school leader enhancement projects with evidence of 

effectiveness. Grantees use the funds to recruit, select, and prepare or provide professional 

development activities for teachers or principals. 

This is a forward-funded program that includes advance appropriations. A portion of the funds 

becomes available for obligation on July 1 of the fiscal year in which they are appropriated and 

remains available for 15 months through September 30 of the following year. The remaining 

funds become available on October 1 of the fiscal year following the appropriations act and 

remain available for 12 months, expiring at the same time as the forward-funded portion.
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Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009...................................................................$2,947,749

2010.....................................................................2,947,749

2011.....................................................................2,464,876

2012.....................................................................2,466,567

2013.....................................................................2,466,5671

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests no funding for the Improving Teacher Quality State Grants 

program, which under the Administration’s ESEA reauthorization proposal would be 

consolidated into a new Excellent Instructional Teams initiative. The new authority would 

include two new programs that would provide formula-based Effective Teachers and Leaders 

grants to States and districts to improve the effectiveness and equitable distribution of teachers 

and leaders and competitive Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund awards to States and 

districts to support the development and implementation of innovative teacher and leader 

policies. With amounts reserved for evaluation and national activities under these programs—

including a 25-percent set-aside within the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants—the 

Department would build evidence on how best to recruit, prepare, and support effective 

teachers and school leaders and invest in efforts to enhance the teaching and leadership 

professions.

This approach would support State and local efforts to: (1) promote and enhance the teaching 

profession; (2) recruit, prepare, develop, reward, and retain effective and highly effective 

teachers, principals, and other school leaders and foster excellent instructional teams, 

especially in high-need LEAs, schools, fields, and subjects; (3) ensure the equitable distribution 

of effective and highly effective teachers and principals; (4) increase the effectiveness of 

teachers and principals; (5) improve the preparation of teachers and principals by developing, 

supporting, and expanding high-performing pathways to becoming a teacher or principal; 

(6) strengthen teacher and principal evaluation systems; (7) ensure that teachers have the 

knowledge, skills, data, support, and collaborative opportunities needed to be effective in the 

classroom; and (8) improve the management of the education workforce in States and local 

educational agencies.

Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants would focus on developing and improving existing 

systems to evaluate teacher and principal effectiveness, based in significant part on student 

growth, as well as other factors. These evaluation systems would be designed to provide 

educators with timely feedback and inform decisions about professional development, 

mentoring, compensation, leadership opportunities, promotion, and other human capital 

matters. States and local educational agencies (LEAs) would have flexibility in how they use 

formula grant funds, but would be accountable for having in place rigorous teacher and principal 

evaluation systems and for ensuring that all students, including students in high-poverty and 
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high-minority schools, have equitable access to teachers and principals who are effective at 

raising student achievement.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

State Grants

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Funding for States awards $2,392,694 $2,392,694 0

Range of States awards 11,494-270,254 11,451-270,091 0

Average State award 46,013 46,013 0

Amount for Outlying Areas 12,271 12,271 0

Amount for BIE 12,271 12,271 0

Evaluation 12,333 12,333 0

Total 2,429,569 2,429,569 0

Supporting Effective Educator Development

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Funding for new awards $25,350 $32,256 0

Number of new awards 3 3 0

Average new award $8,450 10,752 0

Funding for continuation awards $11,279 $4,373 0

Number of continuation awards 2 1 0

Average continuation award $5,640 $4,373 0

Peer review of new award 

applications $370 $370 0

Total $36,999 $36,999 0

_________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 
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progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years as well as the resources and 

efforts invested by those served by this program.

The measures established by the Department to assess the performance of the Improving 

Teacher Quality State Grants program gauge the percentage of core academic classes taught 

by highly qualified teachers in elementary and secondary schools as a whole compared to the 

percentage in high-poverty schools. Since 2007, these data have been collected by the 

Department’s EDFacts/Education Data Exchange Network (EDEN).

Goal: To improve teacher and principal quality and increase the number of highly 

qualified teachers in the classroom and highly qualified principals and assistant 

principals in schools. 

Objective: Show an annual increase in the percentage of classes taught by highly qualified 

teachers. 

Measure: The percentage of core academic classes in high-poverty elementary schools

taught by highly qualified teachers.

Year Target Actual

2009 100 96

2010 100 97

2011 100 97

2012 100

2013 100

Measure: The percentage of core academic classes in high-poverty secondary schools taught 

by highly qualified teachers.

Year Target Actual

2009 100 93

2010 100 95

2011 100 94

2012 100

2013 100

Measure: The percentage of core academic classes taught by highly qualified teachers in 

elementary schools.

Year Target Actual

2009 100 97

2010 100 98

2011 100 98

2012 100

2013 100
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Measure: The percentage of core academic classes taught by highly qualified teachers in 

secondary schools.

Year Target Actual

2009 100 95

2010 100 96

2011 100 95

2012 100

2013 100

Additional information: The program made progress on this objective from 2008 to 2009 and 

from 2009 to 2010 but did not meet the 100 percent targets called for under current law. No 

targets are shown for 2014 because the Administration is proposing to consolidate this program.

Measure: The number of States that reduce the difference between the percentage of core 

academic classes taught by highly qualified teachers in elementary schools in the highestpoverty quartile and the percentage of core academic classes taught by highly qualified 

teachers in elementary schools in the lowest-poverty quartile.

Year Target Actual

2009 31

2010 30

2011 34

Measure: The number of States that reduce the difference between the percentage of core 

academic classes taught by highly qualified teachers in secondary schools in the highestpoverty quartile and the percentage of core academic classes taught by highly qualified 

teachers in secondary schools in the lowest-poverty quartile.

Year Target Actual

2009 31

2010 29

2011 32

Additional information: These measures present the number of States that reduced (from the 

year prior to the year for which the data are reported) the difference in the percentage of core 

academic classes taught by highly qualified teachers in highest-poverty versus lowest-poverty 

schools. For example, 34 States reduced the difference in these percentages in elementary 

schools between 2010 and 2011, and 32 States reduced the difference in these percentages in 

secondary schools between those 2 years. The Department has not set targets for these 

measures because the Administration is proposing to consolidate this program.
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Efficiency Measure

The efficiency measure for the Improving Teacher Quality State Grants program focuses on 

decreasing the average number of days between the date of a monitoring visit and the date that 

the Department sends a monitoring report to the State.

Measure: The average number of days it takes the Department of Education to send a 

monitoring report to States after monitoring.

Year Target Actual

2009 35 29

2010 34 16

Additional information: The Department did not conduct monitoring visits in fiscal year 2011 

because program staff were working with States on their revised State plans for ensuring that all

teachers are highly qualified. In addition, the Department was unable to conduct on-site 

monitoring in 2012 due to a lack of staff capacity. The Department is beginning a new round of 

monitoring, including in-person and desk monitoring, in 2013, but has not set new targets for 

this measure because the Administration is proposing to consolidate the program.

Other Performance Information

The Department has used Improving Teacher Quality State Grants evaluation funds to conduct 

rigorous impact studies on pre-service training, professional development, equitable distribution 

of effective teaching, and teacher retention strategies.

Completed evaluations

A study of pre-service training,

1 released in February 2009, identified different models of teacher 

training, including alternative routes to certification, and compared the performance of students 

taught by teachers who have received different types of preparation. It found no differences in 

performance on reading and math assessments of students taught by teachers trained through 

traditional routes versus teachers who had pursued alternative routes to certification. 

The Department has also invested in two studies of teacher professional development activities 

to identify and then test promising approaches to in-service training. The first, which was 

published in September 2008, examined the extent to which particular professional 

development activities (not necessarily related to federally funded program activities) change 

teaching practices in ways that research suggests are effective in improving student 

achievement in early reading.

2

 It found that although there were positive impacts on teachers’ 

knowledge of scientifically based reading instruction, neither of the two professional 

development activities in the study led to higher student test scores over a 1-year period, and 

 1 An Evaluation of Teachers Trained Through Different Routes to Certification, February 2009, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_training.asp. 2 The Impact of Professional Development Models and Strategies on Teacher Practice and Student 

Achievement in Early Reading, September 2008, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_reading.asp. 
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any additional effect of coaching activities on teaching practices was also statistically 

insignificant. 

The second study examined particular professional development activities that focus on 

improving middle school student achievement in mathematics.

3

 An interim report on this study, 

published in April 2010, found that providing middle-school teachers 1 year of intensive math 

professional development (about 55 hours of specialized training during the 2007-08 school 

year) did not significantly improve their students’ math achievement compared to achievement 

of students whose teachers did not receive that professional development. The training did not 

significantly improve teacher knowledge, either, relative to the comparison group of teachers, 

but did affect one aspect of instructional practice–teachers who received the intensive 

professional development more frequently engaged in activities that elicited student thinking. 

The final report, which was released in May 2011, found that the intensive professional 

development activities were implemented as intended, but teacher turnover limited the amount 

of training teachers received. For example, some teachers left the study schools and others 

entered as the study progressed, so not all teachers had the opportunity to experience the full 

course of professional development. The report found no evidence that the intensive 

professional development resulted in improved teacher knowledge, as measured by a specially 

designed assessment. Finally, there was no evidence that the intensive professional 

development led to improvements in student achievement in the specific math content covered 

by the professional development, rational numbers knowledge. As described below, the 

Department plans to build on lessons learned from this evaluation and next measure the impact 

– on teacher knowledge, classroom practices, and student achievement – of math professional 

development that focuses on mathematical content and integrating that content into the 

classroom at the upper elementary school grades.

The Department has also assessed existing induction programs in order to identify promising 

teacher retention strategies.4 The first report, released in October 2008, found that there was 

no statistically significant difference between retention rates of participants in a comprehensive 

teacher induction activity and teachers in a control group. The second report, released in 

August 2009, includes information from 10 districts in which teachers were offered 1 year of 

induction services (“1-year districts”) and 7 districts in which teachers were offered 2 years of 

induction services (“2-year districts”). The report found no discernible impact of comprehensive 

induction on teacher retention rates after 2 years for either 1-year or 2-year districts. In addition, 

the report found that there were no statistically significant impacts on overall student 

achievement across all grade levels in reading or math during the teachers’ second year. The 

final report on induction programs, released in June 2010, found that among teachers who 

received 2 years of comprehensive induction services, there was no impact on student 

achievement during the first 2 years, but there was a positive impact on student achievement in 

both reading and math in the third and final year of the study. Receiving only 1 year of induction 

services had no impact on student achievement. In addition, neither 1 year nor 2 years of 

comprehensive induction services led to improvements in teacher retention rates. 

 3 Middle School Mathematics Professional Development Impact Study, May 2011, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_mathematics.asp. 4 Impact Evaluation of Teacher Induction Programs; October 2008, August 2009, and June 2010, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_induction.asp. 
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Finally, the Department has used program evaluation funds to assess the progress that States, 

school districts, and schools have made in implementing the teacher quality and professional 

development provisions of the ESEA. The report of this assessment, which was released early 

in 2009, is based on the second round of data collection from the National Longitudinal Study of 

No Child Left Behind and the Study of State Implementation of Accountability and Teacher 

Quality Under No Child Left Behind.

5

 It presents findings from interviews with State education 

officials in all States and surveys of nationally representative samples of school district officials, 

principals, and teachers conducted in 2004-05 and 2006-07. The study found that by 2006-07, 

the vast majority of classes (around 94 percent) were taught by teachers who had met their 

States’ requirements for being considered highly qualified under the ESEA. However, teachers 

in high-poverty and high-minority schools, as well as special education and middle school 

teachers, were more likely to report that they were not highly qualified. Moreover, even among 

teachers who were considered highly qualified, teachers in high-poverty schools had less 

experience and were less likely to have a degree in the subject they taught. In 2006-07, 

44 percent of school districts reported facing moderate or major challenges in attracting 

qualified applicants for teaching positions in mathematics, 53 percent for science, and 

55 percent for special education. More than 90 percent of high-minority districts reported 

difficulty attracting highly qualified applicants in mathematics and science. 

Ongoing evaluations

The Department is currently supporting three additional studies on pre-service teacher 

preparation. One will look at the effectiveness of teachers who chose to enter teaching through 

highly selective alternative routes to certification; the report is expected in summer 2013.6

 

Another will provide descriptive and implementation analyses on teacher residency grant 

projects that include a year-long “clinical” experience, shadowing, and co-teaching with an 

experienced mentor.7

 These grants generally also provide support and mentoring after 

participants become teachers. The study will also include information on retention rates. A 

report from this study is expected in summer 2014. Finally, the Department plans to examine 

teacher preparation programs with features thought to be promising and look at the classroom 

performance of their graduates compared to those from other teacher preparation programs; a 

report is expected in 2015.8

The Department is also continuing research on the effectiveness of in-service teacher training. 

In particular, a study of elementary school math professional development will look at the impact 

of specialized professional development in that area on teachers’ content knowledge and 

 5 State and Local Implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act, Volume VIII--Teacher Quality Under 

NCLB: Final Report, http://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/teaching/nclb-final/index.html. 6 An Evaluation of the Impact on Secondary Student Math Achievement of Two Highly Selective Routes 

to Alternative Certification, http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_alternative.asp. 7 Implementation Evaluation of Teacher Residency Programs, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_residency.asp. 8 A Study of Promising Features of Teacher Preparation Programs, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_teacherprep_us.asp. 
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classroom practices, as well as changes in student achievement.9 The report from this study, 

expected in 2016, will also describe how the professional development was implemented.

The Department is concerned with ensuring the equitable distribution of effective teachers. One 

forthcoming report will provide information about the distribution of effective teachers within 

districts over a 5-year period.10 An interim report is expected in spring 2013. The final report 

will also explore any changes in that distribution that may be associated with district strategies 

to ensure an equitable distribution of effective teachers. Another evaluation in this area is 

looking at the effects of offering incentives to high-performing teachers to teach in lowperforming schools with high-need students.

11 An initial report, published in April 2012, found 

that filling teacher vacancies in these schools using transfer incentives was feasible but required 

a large candidate pool. The report also noted that teachers who transferred had, on average, 

5 years more experience than teachers normally tapped to fill such positions. A final report, 

expected in summer 2013, will also estimate the impact of these teachers on student 

achievement.

The Department is also examining the implementation of policies promoted through ESEA 

Titles I and II at the State, district and school levels, in four core areas: state content standards, 

aligned assessments, accountability and school turnaround, and developing effective teachers 

and leaders. The study will reflect the impact of ESEA flexibility and other initiatives on the 

implementation of Title I and Title II of the ESEA. The first report is expected in late 2014.

 9 Impact Evaluation of Math Professional Development, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_mathpd.asp. 10 Study of the Distribution of Effective Teaching, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_distribution.asp. 11 Impact Evaluation Of Moving High-Performing Teachers to Low-Performing Schools, 

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/projects/evaluation/tq_recruitment.asp. 
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Teacher incentive fund

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title V, Part D, Subpart 1)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: 01

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

$299,433 $299,433 2 0 -$299,433

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. The Administration proposes to consolidate the program in 

FY 2014 under new legislation.

2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) supports States and school districts that develop and 

implement innovative strategies for providing financial incentives to teachers and principals who 

raise student achievement and close achievement gaps in some of our highest-need schools. 

The goals of TIF are to improve student achievement by increasing teacher and principal 

effectiveness; reform teacher and principal compensation systems so that teachers and 

principals are rewarded for gains in student achievement; increase the number of and retain 

effective teachers teaching low-income, minority, and disadvantaged students in hard-to-staff 

subjects; and create sustainable performance-based compensation systems. These systems 

also provide educators with professional development and additional compensation for taking 

on additional responsibilities and leadership roles.

Under TIF, the Department makes competitive 5-year grants to support the development and 

implementation of performance-based compensation systems (PBCSs) that include professional 

development and career advancement opportunities for public school teachers and principals in 

high-need schools. Eligible entities include (1) local educational agencies (LEAs), including 

charter schools that are LEAs; (2) States; and (3) nonprofit organizations in partnership with an 

LEA, a State, or both. Applicants must propose PBCSs that take into consideration gains in 

student achievement as well as other factors, including classroom observations conducted 

multiple times during the year, and must demonstrate a commitment to ensuring the fiscal and 

programmatic sustainability of their projects.

The Department may also use up to 5 percent of TIF funds for technical assistance, training, 

peer review of applications, program outreach, and evaluation activities.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act) provided an additional 

$200 million for TIF in 2009 to allow the Department to significantly expand support for PBCSs. 

The Recovery Act also required the Department, through the Institute of Education Sciences 
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(IES), to conduct a rigorous national evaluation to assess the impact of performance-based 

teacher and principal compensation systems on teacher and principal recruitment and retention 

in high-need schools and subjects. The Recovery Act, in addition to providing a 5-percent 

reservation for an evaluation, allowed the Department to reserve up to 1 percent for 

management and oversight of activities supported by those funds.

The fiscal year 2012 competition included a priority on supporting projects with performancebased compensation systems that not only are well-designed and implemented LEA-wide, but 

also are part of a broader districtwide plan to evaluate teachers and principals fairly and 

rigorously, improve LEA human capital management, improve instruction, and positively affect 

student achievement. This competition also supported projects that proposed innovative ways 

to use performance-based compensation systems to improve instruction and student 

achievement in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics and to build career ladders 

that include school-based instructional leadership positions (such as master teachers, mentor 

teachers, or instructional coach roles).

Funding is appropriated for TIF under the Fund for the Improvement of Education, authorized by 

Title V, Part D, Subpart 1 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, but key program 

requirements are established through annual appropriations language.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009........................................................................$97,270

Recovery Act ..........................................................200,000

2010........................................................................400,000

2011........................................................................399,200

2012........................................................................299,433

2013........................................................................299,4331

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests no funding for the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) for fiscal year 

2014. In place of several narrowly targeted programs that serve current and prospective 

teachers and school leaders, the Administration is proposing to create a broader Excellent 

Instructional Teams initiative through the Elementary and Secondary Education Act 

reauthorization. This initiative would include a new Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund that 

would build on the experience of the TIF program to provide support for State and school district 

efforts to develop and implement innovative approaches to creating human capital systems that 

improve teacher and leader effectiveness and student outcomes. The new program would 

include a focus on the recruitment, development, retention, promotion, and reward of teachers 

and principals who raise student achievement and close the achievement gap in high-need 

schools.
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Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund grantees would use program funds to reform teacher and 

school leader compensation and career advancement systems; support the development and 

implementation of evaluation systems that can be used to guide professional development and 

continuous improvement of instruction; inform retention, tenure, and compensation decisions; 

improve hiring and placement practices and certification and licensure decisions; and implement 

other human resource reforms and innovations to support and strengthen the workforce.

The proposed Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund would reinforce the broader Excellent 

Instructional Teams initiative by supporting compensation systems that reward effective 

teachers’ and leaders’ contributions. These systems can be an important tool in efforts to 

attract effective and highly effective teachers and leaders and build strong instructional and 

school leadership teams in high-need schools, to create robust career advancement systems for 

teachers and other school leaders, and to create more effective professional development 

systems.

Under the Administration’s reauthorization proposal, in fiscal year 2014 TIF continuation grant 

costs would be funded from the new Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Amount for new awards $290,557 0 0

Number of new awards 35 0 0

Average new award $8,302 0 0

Amount for continuation awards 0 $284,461 0

Number of continuation awards 0 93 0

Average continuation award 0 $3,059 0

Technical assistance, training, 

outreach, and evaluation

$7,881 $14,972 0

Peer review of new award 

applications

$995 0 0

_________________

NOTES: Continuation costs of approximately $375,000 thousand in 2014 would be provided from the 

appropriation for the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund.

2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 
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progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years and those requested in 

FY 2014 and future years, as well as the resources and efforts invested by those served by this 

program.

The Department has established the following goal and performance indicators to assess the 

impact of the Teacher Incentive Fund. The Department has not set targets for these indicators 

because the Administration has proposed to consolidate the program in its last 3 budget 

requests.

Goal: Improve student achievement by increasing teacher and principal effectiveness by 

reforming teacher and principal compensation systems so that teachers and principals 

are rewarded for increases in student achievement. 

Objective: Show an increase in the percentage of teachers and principals in high-need schools 

who have a record of effectiveness. 

Measure: The percentage of teachers and principals in high-need schools who have a record 

of effectiveness.

Year 2006 Cohort

Actual

2007 Cohort

Actual

2009 33.0 45.1

2010 35.7 44.3

2011 33.9 44.6

Additional information: The Department collects these data from grantee annual performance 

reports. 

Objective: Show an increase in the percentage of a district’s personnel budget that is used for 

performance-related payments to effective (as measured by student achievement gains) 

teachers and principals. 

Measure: The percentage of a district’s personnel budget that is used for performance-related 

payments to effective teachers and principals (as measured by student achievement gains).

Year 2006 Cohort

Actual

2007 Cohort

Actual

2009 0.7 1.2

2010 1.0 0.7

2011 1.4 0.9

Additional information: The Department collects these data from grantee annual performance 

reports.
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New Measures

The Department established four new measures as part of the 2012 grant competition: (1) the 

percentage of teachers and principals, who are rated at the highest level, at least effective, and 

not effective, as measured by the district's evaluation system and the percentage who are not 

rated; (2) the percentage of teachers teaching in a high-need field or subject, such as teaching 

English learners, students with disabilities, or STEM, who are rated at the highest level, at least 

effective, and not effective, as measured by the district's evaluation system and the percentage 

who are not rated; (3) the percentage of teachers and principals who were rated at the highest 

level, at least effective, and not effective, as measured by the district's evaluation system, and 

the percentage who were not rated, in the previous year and who returned to serve in the same 

high-need school in the LEA; and (4) the percentage of school districts participating in a TIF 

grant that use educator evaluation systems to inform the following human capital decisions: 

recruitment; hiring; placement; retention; dismissal; professional development; tenure; 

promotion; or all of the above.

Other Performance Information

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) is conducting a rigorous national evaluation, using a 

randomized controlled methodology, to assess the impact of performance-based teacher and 

principal compensation systems (PBCSs) on student achievement and teacher and principal 

recruitment and retention in high-need schools and subjects. The Department will release an 

initial report in early 2014. IES is also conducting a study to assess the impact of implementing 

a teacher and leader performance evaluation system on student achievement, classroom 

practices, and teacher and principal mobility. The Department expects to publish an initial 

report in early 2015 and a final report in summer 2016.

In 2012, the Department’s Policy and Program Studies Service (PPSS) published an 

implementation study of the 2006 and 2007 cohorts finding, among other things, that most of the 

34 grantees recognized the importance of providing teachers opportunities to learn how to 

improve their practices so they could earn an award. However, the report noted that in the 

majority of projects almost all teachers and administrators received awards and that many of the 

performance-pay projects faced significant challenges to financial sustainability.

PPSS’s Results in Brief: Providing Effective Teachers for All Students: Examples from Five 

Districts, also published in 2012, looked at five districts that use data on student achievement 

growth to identify effective teachers, implement performance pay initiatives or other human 

resource policies, and seek to ensure an equitable distribution of effective teachers, particularly 

in high-need schools. Three of the districts received TIF grants, and another benefited from TIF 

support through a State grantee. The report described how these districts measure teacher 

effectiveness and some of the challenges they faced, such as hurdles in implementing 

classroom observation systems that were both rigorous and manageable in terms of scheduling 

complexity and time required.

A 2010 report supported by the Gates Foundation, the Joyce Foundation, and the National 

Institute for Excellence in Teaching, Performance-Based Compensation: Design and 

Implementation at Six Teacher Incentive Fund Sites, highlighted six particularly successful 
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grantees in the 2007 Cohort. The report underscored not only improvements in teacher 

practices and outcomes, such as increases in collaboration and retention rates, but also 

significant increases in student achievement at many project sites. For example, students who 

attended participating rural and urban schools in South Carolina and Texas, and participating 

charter schools in New Orleans and Philadelphia, averaged more than 1 year of academic 

growth per school year.
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Transition to teaching

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title II, Part C, Subpart 1, Chapter B)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: 01

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

$26,054 $26,054 2 0 -$26,054

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. The program is proposed for consolidation in FY 2014 

under new legislation. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Transition to Teaching program helps high-need schools and local educational agencies 

(LEAs) recruit and employ qualified licensed or certified teachers by encouraging the 

development and expansion of alternative routes to certification. The program provides 3- to 

5-year grants to recruit, train, certify, and place talented individuals into teaching positions and 

to support them during their first years in the classroom. In particular, the program focuses on 

encouraging two groups of nontraditional teaching candidates to become classroom teachers: 

(1) mid-career professionals with substantial career experience, including highly qualified 

paraprofessionals, and (2) recent college graduates.

Under the program, the Department makes competitive grants to State educational agencies 

(SEAs), high-need LEAs, for-profit or nonprofit organizations (in partnership with SEAs or highneed LEAs) that have a proven record of effectively recruiting and retaining highly qualified 

teachers, institutions of higher education (in partnership with SEAs or high-need LEAs), regional 

consortia of SEAs, or consortia of high-need LEAs. Grantees must develop and implement 

comprehensive approaches to training, placing, and supporting teacher candidates they have 

recruited, including ensuring that candidates meet relevant State certification or licensing 

requirements.

Grantees are expected to ensure that program participants are placed in high-need schools in 

high-need LEAs and must give priority to schools that are located in areas with the highest 

percentages of students from families with incomes below the poverty line. A “high-need 

school” is defined as a school in which at least 30 percent of the students are from low-income 

families or that is located in an area with a high percentage of out-of-field teachers, is within the 

top 25 percent of schools statewide with unfilled teacher positions, is located in an area with a 

high teacher turnover rate, or is located in an area with a high percentage of teachers who are 

not licensed or certified. A “high-need LEA” is defined as an LEA for which at least 20 percent 
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or 10,000 of the children served are from families with incomes below the poverty line and that 

has a high percentage of teachers teaching out-of-field or with emergency credentials.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009 ......................................................................$43,707

2010 ........................................................................43,707

2011 ........................................................................41,125

2012 ........................................................................26,054

2013 ........................................................................26,0541

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration’s fiscal year 2014 budget request includes no funding for Transition to 

Teaching, which would be consolidated into a broader Excellent Instructional Teams initiative 

through the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization. This new initiative would 

include two new programs: the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants program would 

provide formula grants to States and districts to improve the effectiveness and equitable 

distribution of teachers and leaders, and the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund would award 

competitive grants to States and districts to support the development and implementation of 

innovative teacher and leader policies. With amounts reserved for evaluation and national 

activities under these programs – including a 25-percent set-aside from Effective Teachers and 

Leaders State Grants funding dedicated to improving and expanding high-quality teacher and 

leader pathways with evidence of effectiveness – the Department would build evidence on how 

best to recruit, prepare, and support effective teachers and school leaders, and invest in efforts 

to enhance the teaching and leadership professions.

This approach would support State and local efforts to: (1) promote and enhance the teaching 

profession; (2) recruit, prepare, develop, reward, and retain effective and highly effective 

teachers, principals, and other school leaders and foster excellent instructional teams, 

especially in high-need LEAs, schools, fields, and subjects; (3) ensure the equitable distribution 

of effective and highly effective teachers and principals; (4) increase the effectiveness of 

teachers and principals; (5) improve the preparation of teachers and principals by developing, 

supporting, and expanding high-performing pathways to becoming a teacher or principal, 

including alternative routes to certification; (6) strengthen teacher and principal evaluation 

systems; (7) ensure that teachers have the knowledge, skills, data, support, and collaborative 

opportunities needed to be effective in the classroom; and (8) improve the management of the 

education workforce in States and local educational agencies.

The new Excellent Instructional Teams programs would build on lessons learned from the 

Transition to Teaching program’s support for alternative-route programs. The Effective 

Teachers and Leaders State Grants program and the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund 

would provide support for States and LEAs to reform their certification or licensure policies and 
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practices. In addition, the Department would reserve a portion of the appropriation for Effective 

Teachers and Leaders State Grants to make direct awards to create or expand high-quality 

pathways into the teaching profession and other innovative approaches for recruiting, training, 

and placing mid-career professionals and recent college graduates whose knowledge and 

experience can help them become successful teachers in high-need schools. This initiative 

would also support State efforts to dramatically improve the quality of teacher preparation, 

including the development of systems to hold accountable teacher preparation programs, the 

enhancement of teacher certification and licensure standards so that those standards are based 

on performance, and the elimination of barriers to operating effective “alternative route” 

programs.

Under the Administration’s reauthorization proposal, in fiscal year 2014, Transition to Teaching 

continuation grant costs would be funded from the proposed 25-percent national activities 

set-aside under the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants program.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Funding for continuation awards $25,924 $25,924 0

Number of continuation awards 51 50 0

Average continuation award $508 $518 0

Evaluation $130 $130 0

Number of participants 11,100 12,000 0

_________________

NOTES: Continuation costs of approximately $16,381 thousand in fiscal year 2014 would be provided from the 

proposed 25-percent national activities set-aside under the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants program.

2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 

progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years and those requested in fiscal 

year 2014 and future years, as well as the resources and efforts invested by those served by 

this program.

The Transition to Teaching authorization requires that each grantee submit an interim 

evaluation report at the end of the third year of the 5-year grant period and a final evaluation 
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

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H-76

report at the end of the grant. This evaluation must describe the extent to which the grantee 

met program goals relating to teacher recruitment and retention.

The Department established the following goal and performance indicators to assess the impact 

of the Transition to Teaching program:

Goal: To increase the number of mid-career professionals, qualified paraprofessionals, 

and recent college graduates who become highly qualified teachers in high-need schools 

in high-need LEAs and teach for at least 3 years. 

Objective: Recruit, prepare, and retain highly qualified teachers in high-need schools in 

high-need LEAs. 

Measure: The percentage of Transition to Teaching participants who become teachers of 

record in high-need schools in high-need LEAs.

Year

2004 

Cohort 

Target

2004 

Cohort 

Actual

2006 

Cohort 

Target

2006 

Cohort 

Actual

2007 

Cohort 

Target

2007 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 

Cohort 

Target

2009 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 85 76 79 66 60 67

2010 85 85 83 74 79 71 55

2011 85 75 83 72 58 70

2012 85 85 59

2013

2014

Additional information: Because the Department does not expect participants to become 

“teachers of record” in the first year of the program, baseline data are not provided for the first 

year of each cohort.

Measure: The percentage of Transition to Teaching participants receiving certification or 

licensure within 3 years.

Year

2004 

Cohort 

Target

2004 

Cohort 

Actual

2006 

Cohort 

Target

2006 

Cohort 

Actual

2007 

Cohort 

Target

2007 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 

Cohort 

Target

2009 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 50 47 40 31 15 23

2010 50 61 48 45 40 33 17

2011 50 54 48 44 18 30

2012 50 50 19

2013

2014
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Measure: The percentage of Transition to Teaching teachers of record who teach in high-need 

schools in high-need LEAs for 3 years.

Year

2004 

Cohort 

Target

2004 

Cohort 

Actual

2006 

Cohort 

Target

2006 

Cohort 

Actual

2007 

Cohort 

Target

2007 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 

Cohort 

Target

2009 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 77 66

2010 77 62 42 21

2011 43 53 35

2012 43

2013

2014

Additional information: This measure is the number of teachers of record who are still 

teaching after 3 years divided by the total number who began teaching 3 years earlier. Since it 

usually takes at least a year for a participant to find a teaching position, the baseline year for 

each cohort is 4 years after the start of the grant. 

Efficiency Measures

Measure: The cost per participant who teaches in a high-need school in a high-need LEA for 

3 years.

Year

2004 

Cohort 

Target

2004 

Cohort 

Actual

2006 

Cohort 

Target

2006 

Cohort 

Actual

2007 

Cohort 

Target

2007 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 

Cohort 

Target

2009 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 $16,240 $15,287 $33,317

2010 16,240 13,640 $23,317 21,951 $65,537

2011 18,317 19,657 $55,537 41,394

2012 18,317 50,537

2013 50,537

2014

Measure: The cost per participant receiving certification or licensure.

Year

2004 

Cohort 

Target

2004 

Cohort 

Actual

2006 

Cohort 

Target

2006 

Cohort 

Actual

2007 

Cohort 

Target

2007 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 

Cohort 

Target

2009 

Cohort 

Actual

2009 $11,500 $13,013 $23,505 $19,733 $42,392

2010 11,500 8,449 18,505 9,208 $37,392 13,592 $21,324

2011 18,505 10,508 32,392 14,320 $15,602 17,003

2012 18,505 32,392 10,602

2013 32,392 5,602

2014
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Additional information: The denominator for these measures is the cumulative amount of 

money expended for each cohort.

Other Performance Information

In 2006, the Department released Transition to Teaching Program Evaluation: An Interim Report 

on the FY 2002 Grantees, a report prepared for the Department by the American Institutes for 

Research. Using data collected from November 2004 to February 2006, this report examined 

the types of activities grantees implemented, the content and outcomes of the activities, and the 

characteristics and qualifications of participants in the program. The report noted that 

74 percent of participants who entered the Transition to Teaching project in 2002 were reported 

still to be teaching in 2004. In addition, the report found that 20 percent of program participants 

stated that they would likely not be teaching if they had not been involved in a Transition to 

Teaching project.

The Department published an interim report on the fiscal year 2004 grantee cohort in 2009, 

describing the extent to which those grantees met goals related to teacher recruitment, 

certification, and retention as described in their application. The report found that when 

grantees worked closely with their partnering LEAs, they generally identified and selected 

candidates who better matched the needs of the schools in which they could be placed (than 

was the case when there was not a close working relationship). In addition, the report noted 

that projects prepared participants for teaching with courses on a variety of topics, most 

commonly classroom management and instructional strategies. About half of the grantees 

reported offering courses online, and more planned to use this method and other distance 

learning strategies in the future to deliver information to participants. The number of certified 

teachers across projects varied greatly, due, in part, to differences in State certification 

requirements and the fact that many projects devoted significant resources to recruiting and 

preparing teachers in the first three years of implementation. Several grantees commented that 

providing specific test-taking assistance, such as courses tailored to the exam, test preparation 

workshops, and even staffing a “certification specialist,” helped teachers complete the 

certification process in a timely manner. Finally, the report also looked at the support grantees 

provided to new teachers, primarily in the form of mentoring and professional development 

workshops and seminars, to help them adjust to the challenges of the classroom. The data 

suggest that a relationship exists between this type of support and high retention rates. 

However, grantees provided little information about why those who were not retained had left 

their school or project prior to the 3-year benchmark.

The Department expects to release final reports on the fiscal year 2002 and 2004 grantee 

cohorts in spring 2013, an interim report on the 2006 and 2007 grantee cohorts in summer 

2013, and an interim report on the 2009 grantee cohort in fall 2013.
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Teacher quality partnership

(Higher Education Act of 1965, Title II, Part A)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: Indefinite

Budget Authority:

2012 2013

f

o

o

t

n

o

t

e

2014

Change

from 2012

$42,833 $42,8331 0 -$42,833

_________________

1

 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Teacher Quality Partnership (TQP) program seeks to improve student achievement and the 

quality of teachers working in high-need schools and early childhood education (ECE) programs 

by improving the preparation of teachers and enhancing professional development activities for 

teachers; holding teacher preparation programs accountable for preparing effective teachers; 

recruiting highly qualified individuals, including minorities; and attracting talented professionals 

from outside the teaching pipeline into the classroom. Projects may also include a component 

to train school leaders in high-need or rural local educational agencies (LEAs) or a component 

to partner with a public broadcast television station or another entity that develops digital 

education content, to improve the quality of teacher preparation programs. The program is 

intended to help create a variety of effective pathways into teaching and support our Nation’s 

teaching force in improving student outcomes.

Only partnerships may apply for funding under this program. Partnerships must include a highneed LEA; a high-need school or high-need ECE program (or a consortium of high-need 

schools or ECE programs served by the partner LEA); a partner institution of higher education 

(IHE); a school, department, or program of education within the partner IHE; and a school or 

department of arts and sciences within the partner IHE. A partnership may also include, among 

others, the Governor of the State, the State educational agency, the State board of education, 

the State agency for higher education, or a business.

In order to maximize resources and avoid duplication, applicants are required to explain how 

they plan to coordinate activities under the TQP program with other federally funded programs 

aimed at improving teacher effectiveness (e.g., Teacher Quality State Grants under Title II of 

the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and the Teacher Incentive Fund).
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The following three types of grants are eligible for funding through the program: 

Pre-Baccalaureate Preparation of Teachers program (Pre-Baccalaureate) — Grants are 

provided to implement a wide-range of reforms in teacher preparation programs and, as 

applicable, preparation programs for early childhood educators. These reforms may include, 

among other things, implementing curriculum changes that improve and assess how well 

prospective teachers develop teaching skills; using teaching and learning research so that 

teachers implement research-based instructional practices and use data to improve classroom 

instruction; developing a high-quality and sustained pre-service clinical education program that 

includes high-quality mentoring or coaching; creating a high-quality induction program for new 

teachers; implementing initiatives that increase compensation for qualified early childhood 

educators who attain 2-year and 4-year degrees; developing and implementing high-quality 

professional development for teachers in partner high-need LEAs; developing effective 

mechanisms, which may include alternative routes to certification, to recruit qualified individuals 

into the teaching profession; and strengthening literacy instruction skills of prospective and new 

elementary and secondary school teachers.

Teaching Residency program — Grants are provided to develop and implement teacher 

residency programs that are based on models of successful teaching residencies and that serve 

as a mechanism to prepare teachers for success in high-need schools and academic subjects. 

Grant funds must be used to support programs that provide, among other things, rigorous 

graduate-level course work to earn a master’s degree while undertaking a guided teaching 

apprenticeship; learning opportunities alongside a trained and experienced mentor teacher; and 

clear criteria for selecting mentor teachers based on measures of teacher effectiveness. 

Programs must place graduates in targeted schools as a cohort in order to facilitate professional 

collaboration and provide a 1-year living stipend or salary to members of the cohort, which must 

be repaid by any recipient who fails to teach full time at least 3 years in a high-need school and 

subject or area.

School Leadership program — Grants are provided to develop and implement effective school 

leadership programs to prepare individuals for careers as superintendents, principals, early 

childhood education program directors, or other school leaders. Such programs must promote 

strong leadership skills and techniques so that school leaders are able to:

• Create a school climate conducive to professional development for teachers;

• Understand the teaching and assessment skills needed to support successful classroom 

instruction; 

• Use data to evaluate teacher instruction and drive teacher and student learning, 

• Manage resources and time to improve academic achievement, 

• Engage and involve parents and other community stakeholders, and 

• Understand how students learn and develop in order to increase academic achievement. 

Grant funds must also be used to develop a yearlong clinical education program, a mentoring 

and induction program, and programs to recruit qualified individuals to become school leaders. 
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Partnerships may apply for funding under the Pre-Baccalaureate program, the Teaching 

Residency program, or both, and may also seek separate funding under the School Leadership 

program. In addition, grant funds are available to develop digital education content to carry out 

the activities for Pre-baccalaureate or Teaching Residency programs, but not for School 

Leadership programs. Partnerships are eligible to receive grants to support Pre-Baccalaureate 

or Teaching Residency programs for up to 5 years and must provide matching funds from nonFederal sources equal to at least 100 percent of the grant amount.

Program funds also can be used to support evaluations of program activities, and, in 2010, the 

Department awarded a contract for an evaluation of teacher residency programs supported 

through grants awarded in 2009 and 2010. 

The HEOA also allows the Department to use program funds to support the State teacher 

quality accountability reporting system, as authorized by sections 205-207 of the Higher 

Education Act. The State teacher quality accountability reporting system gathers data from all 

50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the outlying areas, and the Freely Associated 

States on such topics as the completion rates for traditional and alternative route teacher 

preparation programs, as well as State teacher assessments and certifications. These data are 

reported to Congress and the Nation through the Secretary’s annual report on teacher quality, 

and they provide critical information on both the progress toward the Nation's goal of a highly 

qualified teacher in every classroom, and areas for further improvements are needed 

(http://www2.ed.gov/about/reports/annual/teachprep/index.html). 

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)fo

ot

no

te

2009.......................................................................$50,000 1

Recovery Act.......................................................... 100,000

2010......................................................................... 43,000

2011......................................................................... 42,914

2012......................................................................... 42,833

2013......................................................................... 42,833 2

_________________

1

 Of this amount, the fiscal year 2009 Appropriations Act set aside $6,556 thousand for non-competing 

continuation awards under the antecedent Teacher Quality Enhancement program. 2

 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration’s fiscal year 2014 budget request includes no funding for Teacher Quality 

Partnerships (TQP), which would be consolidated into a broader Excellent Instructional Teams 

initiative through the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization. This new 

initiative would include two new programs: the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants 

program would provide formula grants to States and districts to improve the effectiveness and 

equitable distribution of teachers and leaders, and the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund 
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would award competitive grants to States and districts to support the development and 

implementation of innovative teacher and leader policies. With amounts reserved for evaluation 

and national activities under these programs – including a 25-percent set-aside from Effective 

Teachers and Leaders State Grants funding dedicated to improving and expanding high-quality 

teacher and leader pathways with evidence of effectiveness – the Department would build 

evidence on how best to recruit, prepare, and support effective teachers and school leaders, 

recruit and prepare effective science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) 

teachers, and invest in efforts to enhance the teaching and leadership professions.

This approach would support State and local efforts to: (1) promote and enhance the teaching 

profession; (2) recruit, prepare, develop, reward, and retain effective and highly effective 

teachers, principals, and other school leaders and foster excellent instructional teams, 

especially in high-need LEAs, schools, fields, and subjects; (3) ensure the equitable distribution 

of effective and highly effective teachers and principals; (4) increase the effectiveness of 

teachers and principals; (5) improve the preparation of teachers and principals by developing, 

supporting, and expanding high-performing pathways to becoming a teacher or principal, 

including alternative routes to certification; (6) strengthen teacher and principal evaluation 

systems; (7) ensure that teachers have the knowledge, skills, data, support, and collaborative 

opportunities needed to be effective in the classroom; and (8) improve the management of the 

education workforce in States and local educational agencies.

The new Excellent Instructional Teams programs would build on lessons learned from the TQP 

program’s support for alternative-route programs. The Effective Teachers and Leaders State 

Grants program and the Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund would provide support for States 

and LEAs to reform their certification or licensure policies and practices. In addition, the 

Department would reserve a portion of the appropriation for Effective Teachers and Leaders 

State Grants to make direct awards to create or expand high-quality pathways into the teaching 

profession and other innovative approaches for recruiting, training, and placing mid-career 

professionals and recent college graduates whose knowledge and experience can help them 

become successful teachers in high-need schools. This initiative would also support State 

efforts to dramatically improve the quality of teacher preparation, including the development of 

systems to hold accountable teacher preparation programs, the enhancement of teacher 

certification and licensure standards so that those standards are based on performance, and the 

elimination of barriers to operating effective “alternative route” programs.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

Teacher quality partnership

H-83

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands) 

Measures 2012 footnote2013 footnote2014

Number of continuation awards 28 28 0

Average continuation award $1,511 $1,513 0

Total continuation award funding $42,3101 $42,3532 0

State teacher quality accountability reports $523 $480 0

________________________

NOTES: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175. 

FY 2014 projected costs of $538 thousand for data collection for the State teacher quality accountability reports

would be provided from the funds set aside under the Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants program. There 

will be no grant continuation costs for the TQP program in FY 2014. 1 Continuation costs for these grants in 2012 were $58,802 thousand, which exceeded the amount available, so 

the awards were reduced. 2 Continuation costs for these grants in 2013 are $56,833 thousand, which exceeds the amount available, so the 

awards will be reduced.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, and performance measures.

In 2008, the program was reauthorized and extensively revised as part of the Higher Education 

Opportunity Act. The Department concluded that the performance measures that had been 

developed for the antecedent program were no longer appropriate. As a result, the Department 

developed new measures for the program.

Goal: To increase the quality of teachers in high-need schools and early childhood 

education programs

Objective: To increase the number of new teachers graduating from high-quality teacher 

preparation programs.

Measure: The percentage of program completers (1) who attain initial certification/licensure by 

passing all necessary licensure/certification assessments and attain a bachelor’s degree (prebaccalaureate program) within 6 years or a master’s degree (residency program) within 2 years 

or (2) who attain highly competent early childhood educator status with a bachelor’s degree 

within 6 years or an associate’s degree within 3 years.

Because this performance measure will not provide data for a number of years, the Department 

also created the following measure that would provide data in a shorter timeframe: The 

percentage of program participants who did not graduate in the previous reporting period and 

who persisted in the postsecondary program in the current reporting period.
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H-84

Objective: To improve the subject matter competency of new teachers.

Measure: The percentage of grantees that report improved scores for initial State certification 

or licensure of teachers.

Objective: To increase the retention rate of new teachers in high-need school districts.

Measure: The percentage of beginning teachers who are retained in teaching in the partner 

high-need local educational agency (LEA) or early childhood education (ECE) program 3 years 

after initial employment.

Because this performance measure would not provide data for a number of years, the 

Department also created the following measure that would provide data in a shorter time-frame: 

The percentage of beginning teachers who are retained in teaching in the partner high-need 

LEA or ECE program 1 year after initial employment.

Data for all of the above-mentioned performance measures will come from the revised annual 

performance report. It is expected that initial data for these measures will not be available until 

fall 2013 at the earliest. 

Efficiency Measure

The Department also developed an efficiency measure for this program. The measure is the 

cost of a successful outcome, where successful outcome is defined as retention in the partner 

high-need LEA or ECE program 3 years after initial employment. This measure ties in with the 

program’s new performance measures. Data for the efficiency measure will come from the 

revised annual performance report and will not be available until fiscal year 2013 at the earliest. 

Other Performance Information

In 2010, the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) awarded a contract for an evaluation of the 

teacher residency projects supported through the TQP program to Mathematica Policy 

Research, Inc. Although the evaluation was originally intended to be an impact study that would 

examine whether or not having a teacher residency program graduate as a teacher had an 

effect on student achievement, IES determined that an experimental research design was not 

feasible. Instead, the evaluation has been restructured as an implementation study.

In spring 2011, the evaluator surveyed all 28 TQP teacher residency projects in order to collect 

descriptive information on the characteristics and implementation of the projects. In order to 

limit the administrative burden on schools and districts, for a subset of projects, the evaluator 

conducted interviews with project directors and surveyed teacher residents and their mentors in 

spring 2011. In spring 2012, the evaluator began conducting additional surveys of the teachers 

of record, collecting student administrative data and teacher employment verification data, and 

conducting a survey on teacher mobility. 
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The implementation study is addressing the following research questions:

• How do teachers who complete teacher residency projects compare to other novice 

teachers and to all teachers in their district?

• What is the retention rate of the residency project teachers compared to their novice 

colleagues who weren’t prepared through a teacher residency project?

• What are the characteristics of the teacher residency projects (e.g., length of overall 

program, nature of required coursework and apprenticeship activities, characteristics of 

their assigned mentor teacher, criteria for selecting program participants, etc.)?

• What are the characteristics of the teacher applicants and participants in the teacher 

residency projects?

The descriptive study includes approximately 300 teachers prepared through the TQP program, 

and the study will follow a subset of these teachers for an additional 2 years to collect data on 

teacher retention. IES plans to release the findings of this study in two reports, which are 

scheduled to be completed in fall 2013 and fall 2014. The Department hopes that the findings 

will help inform the implementation of the Excellent Instructional Teams initiatives.
INNOVATION AND INSTRUCTIONAL TEAMS

H-86

School leadership

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title II, Part A, Subpart 5, Section 

2151(b))

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined1

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change 

from 2012

$29,107 $29,107 2 $97,994 +$68,887

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008; reauthorizing legislation is sought for FY 2014. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The School Leadership program provides competitive grants to assist high-need local 

educational agencies (LEAs) in recruiting, training, and retaining principals and assistant 

principals. A high-need LEA is defined as one that: (1) serves at least 10,000 children from lowincome families or serves a community in which at least 20 percent of the children are from lowincome families, and (2) has a high percentage of teachers teaching either outside of their area 

of certification or with emergency, provisional, or temporary certification.

Entities eligible for grants include high-need LEAs, nonprofit organizations, and institutions of 

higher education. Grantees may use their funds to recruit and retain individuals to serve as 

principals in high-need LEAs by: (1) providing financial incentives to aspiring new principals, 

(2) providing stipends to principals who mentor new principals, (3) carrying out professional 

development programs in instructional leadership and management, and (4) providing 

incentives that are appropriate for teachers or individuals from other fields who want to become 

principals and that are effective in retaining new principals.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were: 

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009 ...................................................................... $19,220

2010 ........................................................................ 29,220

2011 ........................................................................ 29,162

2012 ........................................................................ 29,107

2013 ........................................................................ 29,1071

_________________

1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.
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FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $98.0 million for School Leadership for fiscal year 2014, 

$68.9 million more than the fiscal year 2012 level. With this substantial increase in funding, the 

Department would dramatically expand the scope of this program to focus on training highly 

effective leaders for high-need schools and districts.

School leaders are second only to classroom teachers among in-school factors that affect 

student learning. Emerging research shows that effective leaders play a critically important role 

in students’ academic success, especially in high-need schools, by creating cultures of high 

expectations for all students, as well as recruiting and retaining highly effective teachers. This 

research indicates that effective leaders create a vision of academic success for all children in 

their school and encourage other educators to take on leadership roles and responsibilities. 

Moreover, effective principals also provide instructional leadership in addition to carrying out 

management responsibilities.

The 2014 request would support grants for high-quality, large-scale professional development 

for school leaders that build evidence of effectiveness. In particular, the Department would give 

priority to projects that propose to help current principals and school leadership teams master 

essential school leadership skills (such as evaluating and providing feedback to teachers, 

analyzing student data, developing school leadership teams, and creating a positive school 

climate), and deepen school leaders’ understanding of college-and career-ready standards and 

effective instruction aligned to those standards. Grantees serving current school leaders would 

also provide principal managers (such as district superintendents) training on how to support 

and evaluate school leaders, based on research showing that district-level staff play an 

important role in helping develop and retain effective and highly effective principals.

The Department would also create incentives for applicants to set ambitious goals for their 

professional development programs, including goals related to student achievement gains. 

These incentives would also support the adoption of reforms that would enable strong school 

leaders to put their training to good use and perform their jobs effectively, such as providing 

effective principals with greater autonomy over areas like staffing, budgeting, and scheduling. 

The request reflects the growing recognition of the importance of strong school leadership in 

reaching the Nation’s education reform goals and improving student achievement, and is 

designed to complement the Administration’s other proposals. For example, the Department 

would reserve a portion of Effective Teachers and Leaders State Grants funds to prepare school 

leaders and develop school leadership teams who are able to turn around low-performing 

schools. The Department would also make competitive Teacher and Leader Innovation Fund 

grants to support innovative strategies undertaken by States and LEAs to raise the quality of 

teaching and school leadership, including by empowering principals in high-need schools with 

greater authority to select effective instructional teams for their schools.
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Funding for new awards 0 $14,715 $71,524

Number of new awards 0 22 28

Average new award 0 $669 $2,554

Funding for continuation awards $29,107 $14,097 $25,000

Number of continuation awards 43 21 43

Average continuation award $677 $671 $581

Peer review of new award 

applications 0 $150 $980

Evaluation 0 $145 $490

_________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including GPRA goals, 

objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the progress 

made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on the 

cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years and those requested in FY 2014 

and future years, as well as the resources and efforts invested by those served by this program.

The Department has established the following goal with two objectives and corresponding 

performance indicators to measure the impact of the School Leadership program: 

Goal: To increase the number of new, certified principals and assistant principals and to 

improve the skills of current practicing principals and assistant principals, all serving in 

high-need schools in high-need LEAs. 

Objective: To recruit, prepare, and support teachers and individuals from other fields to 

become principals, including assistant principals, in high-need schools in high-need LEAs. 
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Measure: The percentage of participants who meet certification requirements to become a 

principal or assistant principal.

Year 2008 Cohort

Target

2008 Cohort

Actual

2009 Cohort

Target

2009 Cohort

Actual

2010 Cohort

Target

2010 

Cohort

Actual

2009 30 70 20 19

2010 40 58 30 20 20 33

2011 50 69 40 32 30 57

2012 60 50 40

2013 60 50

2014 60

Measure: The percentage of participants who are certified and hired as a principal or assistant 

principal in a high-need local educational agency.

Year 2008 Cohort

Target

2008

Cohort 

Actual

2009 Cohort

Target

2009 Cohort

Actual

2010 Cohort

Target

2010 

Cohort

Actual

2009 50 36 40 26

2010 60 32 50 35 40 57

2011 70 31 60 45 50 69

2012 80 70 60

2013 80 70

2014 80

Measure: The percentage of participants certified through the funded project who are hired as 

a principal or assistant principal in a high-need LEA and who remain in that position for at least 

2 years.

Year 2008 Cohort

Target

2008

Cohort 

Actual

2009 Cohort

Target

2009 Cohort

Actual

2010 Cohort

Target

2010 

Cohort

Actual

2009

2010

2011

2012 29 98

2013

2014

Additional information: These measures track participants who are enrolled in projects 

designed to train and certify new principals and assistant principals. Grantees report data 

through annual performance reports. The Department will use baseline progress results to set 

targets for future years.
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Objective: To train and support principals and assistant principals from schools in high-need 

LEAs in order to improve their skills and increase retention.

Measure: The percentage of principals and assistant principals from schools in high-need 

local educational agencies who participated in School Leadership-funded professional 

development activities and showed an increase in their pre-post scores on a standardized 

measure of principal skills.

Year

2008

Cohort

Target

2008

Cohort

Actual

2009

Cohort

Target

2009

Cohort

Actual

2010

Cohort

Target

2010

Cohort

Actual

2009 50 51 40 0

2010 60 57 50 81 40 11

2011 70 25 60 39 50 30

2012 80 70 60

2013 80 70

2014 80

Measure: The percentage of principals and assistant principals from schools in high-need 

LEAs who participated in School Leadership-funded professional development activities and 

remained in their administrative position for at least 2 years.

Year 2008 Cohort

Target

2008

Cohort 

Actual

2009 Cohort

Target

2009 Cohort

Actual

2010 Cohort

Target

2010 

Cohort

Actual

2009

2010

2011

2012 27 11

2013

2014

Additional information: These measures track participants who are enrolled in projects 

designed to support individuals currently serving as principals and assistant principals in highneed LEAs. Grantees report data through annual performance reports. The Department will 

use baseline progress results to set targets for future years.
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Expanding educational options

(Proposed legislation)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change 

from 2012

0 0 $294,836 +$294,836

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The purpose of the proposed Expanding Educational Options initiative is to increase the supply 

of high-quality public educational options available to students, especially students attending 

low-performing schools, by creating and expanding effective charter and autonomous schools 

and by implementing comprehensive systems of public school choice.

The Administration’s Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) reauthorization proposal 

includes two component programs within the Expanding Educational Options initiative: 

(1) Supporting Effective Charter Schools Grants and (2) Promoting Public School Choice 

Grants. Under Supporting Effective Charter Schools Grants, the Department would make 

competitive grants to State educational agencies (SEAs), charter school authorizers, charter 

management organizations, local educational agencies (LEAs), and other nonprofit 

organizations to start or expand effective charter and autonomous schools and to develop and 

implement outreach programs that provide high-quality information to parents and students 

about the public school options available to them. Autonomous schools would be defined as 

public schools that have autonomy over key areas of operations, including staffing, budget, 

schedule, management, and instructional program, and are subject to higher levels of 

accountability than traditional public schools. The Department would work to ensure that 

funding is focused on the creation of high-quality schools by selecting applicants based on their 

record of success in (depending on the type of grantee) authorizing, supporting, funding, 

overseeing, or operating effective charter and autonomous schools, including their record of 

closing (or terminating funding for) ineffective charter and autonomous schools, as appropriate. 

The Department would also ensure that funding is targeted to areas most in need by selecting 

applicants that demonstrate that they will expand options for students attending low-performing 

schools. The Department would give priority for grants to applicants proposing to create or 

expand charter schools and to applicants that would create or expand schools (whether charter 

or autonomous schools) with significant percentages of students from low-income families, and 

could also give priority to applicants whose schools will work to increase the diversity of their 

student bodies.

In addition, the Department would be authorized to use Supporting Effective Charter Schools

funds to make competitive grants to SEAs, LEAs, community development financial institutions, 
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and State financing authorities for the purposes of improving the access of high-performing 

charter schools to facilities and facilities financing.

Under the second program within the Expanding Educational Options initiative, Promoting 

Public School Choice Grants, the Department would make competitive grants to high-need 

LEAs, and to SEAs in partnership with one or more high-need LEAs, to implement programs of 

public school choice that increase the range of high-quality educational options available to 

students in high-need schools. Grantees would use funds to: (1) develop and implement a 

comprehensive public school choice plan, which could include creating or expanding interdistrict 

and intradistrict choice programs, theme-based school programs, online learning programs, or 

“academic pathway” programs; and (2) develop and implement activities to assist parents and 

students in identifying and accessing high-quality educational options. The Department would 

give priority for grants to applicants that propose to implement or expand an interdistrict choice 

program and to applicants that propose to implement or expand a program that will increase 

diversity. 

The Department would be authorized to reserve up to 5 percent of program funds for national 

activities, including research and development, data collection and analysis, technical 

assistance, and outreach and dissemination.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

For fiscal year 2014, the Administration requests $294.8 million for the proposed Expanding 

Educational Options initiative, an increase of $40 million over the fiscal year 2012 level for 

Charter Schools Grants. The Administration’s ESEA reauthorization proposal recognizes the 

continued importance of increasing the availability of high-quality educational options, especially 

for students attending low-performing schools, and ensuring that families have the information 

they need to choose from among their options. This new initiative would improve upon existing 

ESEA public school choice programs by, among other things, funding applicants based on their 

record of success with respect to charter and autonomous schools and by supporting 

strengthened information and outreach campaigns. 

In fiscal year 2014, the Department would use Expanding Educational Options funds for 

continuation awards for grants made prior to ESEA reauthorization under Charter Schools 

Grants, for new Supporting Effective Charter Schools Grants, and for national activities, and 

intends to use the increase proposed for 2014 for new Supporting Effective Charter Schools 

Grants to charter management organizations and LEAs for the replication and expansion of 

high-quality charter schools. 

Although Promoting Public School Choice Grants would be authorized under the 

Administration’s ESEA reauthorization proposal, the Administration is not requesting funds for 

this program in fiscal year 2014.
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2014

Supporting Effective Charter Schools Grants

Amount for new awards $62,973

Number of new awards 25-40

Peer review of new award applications $250

Continuation awards for antecedent programs $216,871

National activities $14,742 _______________

NOTE: Approximately $216,871 thousand in fiscal year 2014 would be provided under Supporting Effective 

Charter School Grants to fund continuation awards for grants made under Charter Schools Grants (including 

$176,286 thousand for SEA grants, $5,118 thousand for Non-SEA Eligible Applicant grants, and $35,467 thousand 

for Charter Management Organization grants).

.
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Exp anding education al option s conso lid ation s:

Charter schools grants

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title V, Part B, Subpart 1)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: 01

Budget Authority:

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

$254,8362,3 $254,8364 0 -$254,836

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. The Administration proposes to consolidate the program in 

FY 2014 under new legislation.

2

 From the amount appropriated for Charter Schools, the fiscal year 2012 appropriations act required the 

Department to use not less than $22,957 thousand for State Facilities Incentive grants and Credit Enhancement for 

Charter School Facilities grants. 3 Reflects a reprogramming in fiscal year 2012 of $200 thousand from Charter Schools Grants to Advanced 

Placement to help address a funding shortfall in the Advanced Placement Test Fee program. 4 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Charter Schools program supports the planning, development, initial implementation, and 

replication of charter schools, which increase educational options for parents and students and, 

in exchange for stricter accountability, are exempt from many State and local requirements 

governing traditional public schools.

State educational agencies (SEAs) in States in which State law permits charter schools to 

operate are eligible to compete for grants (SEA grants). States receiving grants make 

subgrants to charter school developers, which may include individuals and public and private 

nonprofit organizations. If an eligible SEA does not receive a grant, charter school developers 

in the State may apply directly to the Department for funding (Non-SEA Eligible Applicant 

grants). Developers receive up to 3 years of assistance, of which they may use not more than 

18 months for planning and program design and not more than 2 years for the initial 

implementation of a charter school. States may reserve up to 10 percent of their grants to make 

subgrants to successful charter schools for information dissemination activities; charter schools 

in eligible States not receiving a grant may also apply directly to the Department for grants for 

dissemination.

In awarding SEA grants, the Department must give priority to States that provide for review and 

evaluation of charter schools by their chartering agencies at least once every 5 years to 

determine whether the schools are meeting their charter terms and their requirements and goals 

for student academic achievement. The Department must also give priority to States that do 

one or more of the following: (1) demonstrate progress in increasing the number of charter 
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schools that are held accountable for results; (2) have chartering agencies that are not local 

educational agencies (LEAs) or, if only LEAs are chartering agencies, have an appeals process 

for prospective charter schools that initially fail to gain approval; (3) and provide charter schools 

a high degree of autonomy over their budgets and expenditures.

Under the authorizing statute, the Department must use the amount appropriated above 

$200 million but not exceeding $300 million, as well as 50 percent of any funds exceeding 

$300 million, to make competitive 5-year grants under the State Facilities Incentive Grants 

program. State Facilities Incentive Grants support per-pupil aid programs that assist charter 

schools with facility costs. States pay an increasing share of the cost of their per-pupil aid

programs over the course of their grants.

Beginning in fiscal year 2010, appropriations language has revised the program’s allocation 

rules to authorize or require the Department to use specific amounts for State Facilities 

Incentive grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter Schools Facilities grants and to make

grants to charter management organizations and other nonprofit entities for the replication and 

expansion of successful charter school models (Charter Management Organization grants). For 

fiscal year 2012, the appropriations act required the Department to use not less than $23 million

for State Facilities Incentive grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities grants 

and authorized the Department to use up to $54.9 million for Charter Management Organization 

grants.

The authorizing statute also permits the Department to use up to $8 million of the appropriation 

for national activities. Recent years’ appropriations acts have overridden this cap and allowed 

the use of a higher amount for this purpose, including for technical assistance to public 

chartering agencies to increase the number of high-performing charter schools. The fiscal year 

2012 appropriations act authorized the Department to use up to approximately $11 million for 

these activities.

Funding levels for the program for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009 .................................................................... $216,031

2010 ...................................................................... 256,031

2011 ...................................................................... 255,519

2012 ...................................................................... 254,8361 

2013 ...................................................................... 254,8362

_________________

1 Reflects a reprogramming in fiscal year 2012 of $200 thousand from Charter Schools Grants to Advanced 

Placement to help address a funding shortfall in the Advanced Placement Test Fee program. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration is not requesting funding for the Charter Schools program for fiscal year 

2014. In place of this and several other, sometimes narrowly targeted, programs that seek to 
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expand educational options for students and families, the Administration has proposed to create 

a broader initiative, Expanding Educational Options, through the Elementary and Secondary 

Education Act (ESEA) reauthorization. This new initiative would address the need to increase 

the supply of high-quality public educational options available to students, especially students 

attending low-performing schools, through support of effective charter and autonomous schools 

and comprehensive systems of public school choice. 

The proposed Expanding Educational Options authority, described in more detail elsewhere in 

this account, includes a new Supporting Effective Charter Schools Grants program. Under this 

program, the Department would make competitive grants to SEAs, charter school authorizers, 

charter management organizations, LEAs, and other nonprofit organizations to start or expand 

effective charter and autonomous schools and to develop and implement outreach programs 

that provide high-quality information to parents and students about the public school options 

available to them. Funds would also be available for competitive grants for charter schools 

facilities programs. Recipients of funds under the current Charter Schools program and other 

applicants would be eligible to apply for funds under the new Supporting Effective Charter 

Schools grants program to start or expand charter and autonomous schools. 

The creation and expansion of charter schools remains a key element of the Administration’s 

strategy to promote successful models of school reform. The Department would work to ensure 

that funding is focused on the creation of high-quality schools by selecting applicants based on 

their record of success in (depending on the type of grantee) authorizing, supporting, funding, 

overseeing, or operating effective charter and autonomous schools, including their record of 

closing (or terminating funding for) ineffective charter and autonomous schools, as appropriate; 

and would also ensure that funding is targeted to areas most in need by selecting applicants 

that demonstrate that they will expand options for students attending low-performing schools. 

The Department would give priority for grants to applicants proposing to create or expand 

charter schools and to applicants that would create or expand schools (whether charter or 

autonomous schools) with significant percentages of students from low-income families, and 

could also give priority to applicants whose schools will work to increase the diversity of their 

student bodies. 

Under the Administration’s reauthorization proposal, fiscal year 2014 Charter Schools grant 

continuation costs would be funded from the appropriation for the new Expanding Educational 

Options initiative. 

If the Congress does not reauthorize the ESEA prior to enactment of fiscal year 2014 

appropriations, the Administration will request authority through appropriations language to use 

up to $75 million of the 2014 appropriation for Charter Management Organization grants and to 

allow grantees to use funds for pre-kindergarten education, which some grantees are not 

permitted to do under the current-law definition of “charter school.”
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

SEA grants

Amount for new awards $17,392 0 0

Amount for supplemental awards 3,647 0 0

Amount for continuation awards 162,794 $178,929 0

Non-SEA Eligible Applicant grants

Amount for new awards 3,842 4,000 0

Amount for continuation awards 3,078 4,902 0

Charter Management Organization 

grants

Amount for new awards 14,416 4,530 0

Amount for continuation awards 16,654 29,952 0

State Facilities Incentive grants

Amount for continuation awards 12,000 11,000 0

Peer review of new award 

applications 150 100 0

National activities 9,827 9,423 0 _______________

NOTES: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

The amounts shown on this table do not include $11,036 thousand in 2012 and $12,000 thousand in 2013 for 

Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities, which are shown in the program output measures for that activity.

Continuation costs of approximately $216,871 thousand (including $176,286 thousand for SEA grants, 

$5,118 thousand for Non-SEA Eligible Applicant grants, and $35,467 thousand for Charter Management Organization 

grants) would be provided from the appropriation for Expanding Education Options in fiscal year 2014.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures 

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 

progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years and those requested in fiscal 

year 2014 and future years as well as the resources and efforts invested by those served by this 

program.

Goal: To support the creation of a large number of high-quality charter schools.
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Objective: To encourage the development of a large number of high-quality charter schools 

that are free from State or local rules that inhibit flexible operation, are held accountable for 

enabling students to reach challenging State performance standards, and are open to all 

students.

Measure: The number of States that have charter school legislation (including the District of 

Columbia and Puerto Rico). 

Year Target Actual

2009 44 41

2010 44 41

2011 44 42

2012 44 43

2013 44

2014 44

Additional information: In 2011 and in 2012, after more than 8 years with no change in the 

number of States with charter school legislation, this number increased when first Maine (in 

2011) and then Washington (in 2012) approved such legislation. The remaining States without 

charter school laws are mainly rural States (e.g., South Dakota, Vermont, West Virginia). 

Measure: The number of charter schools in operation around the Nation.

Year Target Actual

2009 4,720 4,700

2010 5,190 4,991

2011 5,660 5,339

2012 6,130

2013 6,600

2014 7,062

Additional information: Data on the number of charter schools in operation are provided

annually by State educational agencies and are verified by the Department. 2012 data for this 

measure are expected to be available in December 2013.
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Measure: The percentage of fourth-grade charter school students who are achieving at or 

above proficient on State assessments in reading. 

Year Target Actual

2009 74.4 71.1

2010 79.5 72.2

2011 84.6 70.9

2012 89.7

2013 94.8

2014 100.0

Measure: The percentage of fourth-grade students in charter schools who are achieving at or 

above proficient on State assessments in mathematics.

Year Target Actual

2009 72.5 70.1

2010 78.0 72.6

2011 83.5 71.2

2012 89.0

2013 94.5

2014 100.0

Measure: The percentage of eighth-grade charter school students who are achieving at or 

above proficient on State assessments in reading. 

Year Target Actual

2009 74.7 70.8

2010 79.8 70.9

2011 84.8 71.2

2012 89.9

2013 94.9

2014 100.0

Measure: The percentage of eighth-grade students in charter schools who are achieving at or 

above proficient on State assessments in mathematics.

Year Target Actual

2009 65.1 62.3

2010 72.1 59.5

2011 79.1 60.2

2012 86.1

2013 93.1

2014 100.0
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Additional information: Performance targets for these measures are based on the ESEA goal 

of 100 percent student proficiency in reading and mathematics by 2014. 

Data for these measures are collected through grantee annual performance reports. Analysis of 

the data has found notable variation in performance among the schools funded. 2012 data for 

these measures are expected to be available in December 2013.

Efficiency Measures

Measure: The ratio of funds leveraged by States for charter facilities to funds awarded by the 

Department under the State Charter School Facilities Incentive Grant Program.

Year 2009 Cohort Target 2009 Cohort Actual

2010 Baseline 1.6

2011 2.9 2.4

2012 4.2 3.2

2013 5.8

2014 6.3

Additional information: This efficiency measure assesses the State Facilities Incentive grants 

by examining the ratio of funds leveraged by grantees to funds awarded by the Department. 

The leveraging ratio is the total funds available (the Federal grant and the State match) divided 

by the Federal grant for a given year. 

The Department has also developed a measure to assess the cost efficiency, across States, of 

the Federal investment in supporting charter school start-ups. The measure is defined as the 

Federal cost per student of launching a successful school (defined as a school in operation for 

3 or more years). Data for 2009 show an average cost of $904 per student, for 2010 an 

average cost of $789 per student, and for 2011 an average cost of $920 per student. Data for 

this measure, collected through grantee annual performance reports, assist the Department in 

determining what constitutes a reasonable cost per student for different types of charter 

schools. 

Other Performance Information

In 2010, the Department released findings from its first impact evaluation of charter schools, 

which addressed the effects of charter school strategies on student achievement and 

satisfaction and on parent satisfaction. Researchers also examined school factors that affect 

student outcomes (e.g., school or class size, proportion of certified teachers) and the extent to 

which policy conditions and autonomy in school operation influence effectiveness. 

Approximately 36 charter middle schools across 15 States participated in this random 

assignment study. The researchers followed two treatment groups of students and a control 

group for two consecutive grade levels and also surveyed students, parents, and principals. 

The evaluation showed that the impact of charter middle schools on student achievement varied 

across participating schools, with schools that served more low-income or low-achieving 

students showing statistically significant positive effects in mathematics and no significant 
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effects in reading, and with schools that served more advantaged students showing significant 

negative effects in both subjects. The evaluation also examined whether achievement impacts 

were associated with certain school characteristics and found some positive impacts for charter 

schools with comparatively longer hours of operation or with comparatively higher revenue per 

student, but these findings were not statistically significant once the researchers controlled for 

school and student characteristics. Lastly, the evaluation found no significant relationship 

between charter school policies and student achievement. 

Multiple Choice: Charter School Performance in 16 States, a 2009 study by researchers at 

Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO), examined 

longitudinal student-level data from a sample of 2,403 charter schools across 15 States and the 

District of Columbia to determine whether students who attend charter schools performed better 

academically than if they had attended a traditional public school. The researchers found that 

17 percent of charter schools in the sample demonstrated significantly higher growth in 

mathematics achievement compared to traditional public schools in the sample, and 46 percent 

of charter schools produced mathematics gains that were indistinguishable from the average 

growth among traditional public schools. The remaining 37 percent of charter schools in the 

sample posted gains that were significantly below what those students would have seen if 

enrolled in a traditional public school. The researchers also performed a State-by-State 

analysis of charter school results and found that the effectiveness of charter schools varies by 

State and depends on each State’s charter school law and policies: the academic growth of 

students in charter schools was higher in States with no cap on the number of charter schools 

that may operate and where there was only one charter school authorizer. 

The analysis also showed that, in general, charter schools have had different effects on 

students of different family backgrounds. For students from low-income families or English 

learners, charter schools had a larger, more positive effect academically compared to similar 

students in traditional public schools. The researchers also found that students perform better 

in charter schools over time, with charter schools students on average experiencing some 

decline in learning in their first year but positive academic gains in the second and third years.

Other recent studies have used a more rigorous experimental research design to compare the 

performance of students who were admitted by lottery into oversubscribed charter schools and 

those who were not admitted and instead attended traditional public schools. Hoxby, Murarka, 

and Kang, in a 2009 report for the New York City (NYC) Charter School Evaluation Project, 

found a positive achievement effect for students attending the city’s charter schools. By the 

third grade, the average NYC charter school student scored 5.3 scale-score points above his or 

her peers in traditional public schools in English language arts and 5.8 scale-score points above 

in mathematics. In grades four through eight, the average charter school student gained

3.6 more scale-score points in English language arts and 5.0 more scale-score points in 

mathematics than did peers in traditional public schools each year. Hoxby and colleagues 

noted that, on average, students who attended a charter school for grades kindergarten through 

eight scored about 23 scale-score points higher in English language arts and 30 scale-score 

points higher in mathematics compared to their peers in traditional public schools, closing about 

66 and 86 percent of the achievement gap in those subject areas, respectively. The evaluation 

also found that students applying to NYC charter schools were more likely to be African 

American (63 percent versus 34 percent) and eligible for free or reduced-price lunch (92 percent 
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versus 72 percent) than students in the traditional public schools in the district. The researchers 

also examined charter school policies in relation to achievement and found that effects on 

achievement were associated with the length of the school year, the number of minutes devoted 

to English language arts during the school day, whether teacher compensation was based on 

performance, and whether a school’s mission statement emphasized academic performance. 

In January 2013, CREDO released findings from Charter School Growth and Replication, which 

examines, in charter schools across 25 States, changes in school performance in the years 

following a school’s opening and the implications of these changes for school replication. The 

study found, among other things, that schools with initial high performance with respect to 

student achievement tended to stay high performers over time, while the performance of initially 

low-performing schools remained low. The study also found that schools opened by a charter 

management organization (CMO) typically performed at a level similar to the average of the 

other schools operated by the CMO. 

In light of the changing charter school landscape and recent research findings, the Department 

has initiated new data collection and analysis activities, including the development of a central 

warehouse of data on charter schools providing detailed information on a complete list of 

charter schools in operation across the Nation; a data-reporting guide for States; and issue 

briefs on key charter school topics using available data. The development of the data 

warehouse, which included a reconciliation of multiple charter school data sets, was completed 

in November 2012, and the data-reporting guide, which incorporates lessons learned from the 

reconciliation, is expected to be released in the spring of 2013. The Department believes that 

these activities have improved, and will continue to strengthen, the quality and reliability of our 

charter school data. We expect to publish the issue briefs later in 2013.
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Credit enhancement for charter school facilities

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title V, Part B, Subpart 2)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: 01

Budget Authority:

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

$11,0362 $12,0002,3 0 -$11,036

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2004. The Administration proposes to consolidate the program in 

FY 2014 under new legislation. 2 The FY 2012 appropriation did not provide a separate appropriation for this program; instead, from the amount 

provided for Charter Schools, the appropriations language required the Secretary to use at least $22,957 thousand

for Charter School Facilities Incentive Grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities. The Department 

expects to use the same amount for State Facilities Incentive Grants and Credit Enhancement for Charter School 

Facilities in FY 2013. The Department used $11,036 thousand for the Credit Enhancement program in FY 2012 and 

expects to use $12,000 thousand of the FY 2013 Charter Schools appropriation for the Credit Enhancement program. 3 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities program provides assistance to help 

charter schools meet their facility needs. Under this program, funds are provided on a 

competitive basis to public and nonprofit entities, and consortia of such entities, to leverage 

funds and help charter schools obtain school facilities through such means as purchase, lease, 

and donation, as well as the construction and renovation of school facilities. The grant period 

runs until the Federal funds and earnings on those funds have been expended for grant 

purposes or until financing facilitated by the grant has been retired, whichever is later.

To help leverage funds for charter school facilities, grant recipients may, among other things: 

guarantee and insure debt to finance charter school facilities; guarantee and insure leases for 

personal and real property; and facilitate charter schools’ facilities financing by identifying 

potential lending sources, encouraging private lending, and other, similar activities. These 

credit enhancements are intended to reduce risk to the lender, thereby creating access to credit 

or lowering interest rates and costs of borrowing for charter schools.

Some of the grantees have been community development financial institutions (CDFIs), which 

typically specialize in project finance and economic development in low-income communities. 

The remaining grantees have been nonprofit organizations, State public finance authorities, and 

one local public finance authority.
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Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands) 

2009 ......................................................................... $8,300

2010 ........................................................................... 8,300

2011 ......................................................................... 10,036

2012 ......................................................................... 11,0361

2013 ......................................................................... 12,000 _________________

NOTE: The Department used $8,300 thousand from each of the FY 2009 and FY 2010 appropriations, 

$10,036 thousand from the FY 2011 appropriation, $11,036 thousand from the FY 2012 appropriation, and plans to 

use $12,000 thousand of the Charter Schools appropriation for Credit Enhancement for Charter School Facilities. 1 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration is not requesting separate funding for the Credit Enhancement for Charter 

School Facilities program for fiscal year 2014. In place of this and several other narrowly 

targeted programs that seek to expand educational options for students and families, the 

Administration is proposing to create a broader initiative, Expanding Educational Options, 

through the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization. This new initiative would 

address the need to increase the supply of high-quality public educational options available to 

students, especially students attending low-performing schools, by creating and expanding 

effective charter and other autonomous schools, implementing comprehensive systems of 

public school choice, supporting magnet schools that improve student achievement and 

promote diversity, and strengthening parent information and outreach efforts across these 

programs.

More specifically, the Expanding Educational Options initiative, would include a new authority 

for Supporting Effective Charter Schools Grants. This new authority would focus on competitive 

grants to start or expand effective charter and autonomous schools and to provide high-quality 

information to parents and students about the public school choice options, while also providing 

support for charter schools facilities programs.

The Administration recognizes the importance of and need for continued support for charter 

school facilities and the challenges that charter schools encounter in financing and obtaining 

adequate facilities. The demands on and for charter school facilities are significant due both to 

the expansion of the number of public charter schools and to rapidly increasing enrollments in 

existing charter schools. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, while overall 

enrollment in public elementary and secondary schools increased by 0.5 percent between 

school years 2007-08 and 2010-11, charter school enrollment increased by 40 percent. 

While charter schools receive public funding for operations, they often must find and finance 

their own facilities and have had difficulty obtaining funds in the same manner as traditional 

LEAs and public schools. Additionally, charter schools are less likely to be able to take 

advantage of economies of scale in their acquisition, construction, and renovation of facilities 

because they generally have smaller enrollments. In the 2010-11 school year, average 
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enrollment in traditional schools was 471 at the elementary level and 639 at the secondary level, 

while average enrollment in charter schools was 316 at the elementary level and 250 at the 

secondary level. 

Charter schools have persistently received mediocre credit ratings, which has made capital 

financing challenging. In a March 2006 article, U.S. Charter School Ratings Continue to Grow 

as the Market Broadens, Standard & Poor’s indicated that 74 percent of charter school bonds 

were at or below the lowest investment grade rating, causing charter schools to pay higher 

interest rates than those typically paid by LEAs. A 2006 Moody’s Investors Service report cited 

limited capital funding, tight operating budgets, and the risk of declining enrollments as likely 

ongoing challenges to charter school credit worthiness. This difference has likely become even 

more pronounced during the more challenging financial environment of recent years. The 

Expanding Educational Options initiative would include, among its authorized activities, grants 

to SEAs, LEAs, CDFIs, and State financing authorities to improve access to facilities and 

facilities financing for high-performing charter schools, including by supporting implementation 

of credit enhancement strategies.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Amount of new grants $6,019 $7,348 0

Number of new grants 2 2 0

Amount of grant supplements $5,017 $4,652 0

Number of grant supplements 1 1 0

Peer review of new award applications 0 1 01 0

Estimated amount of charter school 

facilities funds leveraged over the life 

of the grants $280,0002 $300,000 2 0

Estimated number of charter schools 

served over the life of the grants 60 50 0

_________________

NOTE: The fiscal year 2013 data exclude the 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175. 1 In FY 2012, the Department funded additional applicants from the FY 2011 slate. In FY 2013, the Department 

plans to fund applicants from the FY 2011 slate again. 2 The amount leveraged is the dollar amount raised as a direct result of the guarantee, bond insurance, or other 

credit-enhancing instrument. If the grantee received a non-Department of Education grant or a New Markets Tax 

Credit allocation and is using it to provide additional financing for a school served by the Credit Enhancement grant, 

funds leveraged from these other sources may also be counted as funds leveraged by the grant.
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PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 

progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years as well as the resources and 

efforts invested by those served by this program.

Goal: To increase the number of charter school facilities acquired, constructed, or 

renovated.

Objective: Increase funds available for the acquisition, renovation, or construction of charter 

school facilities.

Measure: The amount of funding Credit Enhancement program grantees leverage for the 

acquisition, construction, or renovation of charter school facilities (in millions of dollars).

Year Target Actual

2009 $200 $670

2010 200 424

2011 200 555

2012 200

2013 200

2014 200

Objective: Increase the number of charter schools facilities acquired, constructed, or 

renovated.

Measure: The number of charter schools served through the Credit Enhancement for Charter 

School Facilities Program.

Year Target Actual

2009 60 59

2010 60 41

2011 60 48

2012 60

2013 60

2014 60

Additional information: Data for the program have shown net decreases in the amount of 

funding leveraged and the number of schools served over the last 2 years. In 2009, new and 

continuing grantees leveraged $670 million and served 59 schools that had not been served 

before. In 2011, grantees leveraged $555 million and served 48 schools. The amount of 
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leveraged funds in 2011 still exceeded the target of $200 million, while the number of schools is

below the target of 60. Data for 2012 will be available in spring 2013. Targets for 2013 and 

2014 are included because, while this program does not make multi-year awards (and, thus, will 

have no continuation costs in fiscal year 2013 or fiscal year 2014), the grant activities are 

implemented over a number of years and existing grantees will continue to report on these

measures. Over the life of the program, it has provided 428 schools (8 percent of the Nation’s 

charter schools) with $2.7 billion in total financing, including leveraged funds. 

Other Performance Information

The Department has tracked the level of defaults on loans facilitated. As of 2012, only $0.50 of 

every $100 of grant funds had been lost to default over the life of the program. When leveraged 

funds are taken into account, this comes to approximately $0.04 for every $100 of the total 

amount supported through the program. 

The Department completed an evaluation of the program in 2008. The evaluation addressed 

three primary research questions: (1) Is the program achieving its legislative purpose?; 

(2) Does the program provide for improved access to capital markets for facilities and for better 

rates and terms on financing than would be otherwise available to charter schools?; and (3) Do 

certain models of credit enhancement provide for more favorable outcomes than others?

The study found that the program is achieving its purpose and improving the borrowing 

capabilities of charter schools. Representatives of grantees, commercial lenders, investment 

banks, and rating agencies reported that, without the program, assisted schools would not have 

received facilities loans at any price. Unsuccessful applicants generally were not able to 

support their proposed lending levels, providing evidence that the program does provide 

improved access. Entities that used their program funds to credit-enhance a loan made by a 

lender or a bond purchased by an investor supported higher lending volumes and a greater 

number of schools than those making direct loans, indicating that the grantees tend to be more 

effective when acting as a third-party credit-enhancing agent rather than as a direct lender. 

(However, this finding is not conclusive, since it was based on a small number of grantees.) 

Additional findings include that entities that had experience making direct loans to charter 

schools before becoming grantees were able to provide a significantly higher volume of loans 

after receiving program awards, and that charter schools assisted through the program were 

generally located in census tracts with a lower median household income than the relevant 

county as a whole and had a higher proportion of minority students than traditional public 

schools or even other charter schools.
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Magnet schools assistance

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title V, Part C)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined1

Budget Authority: 

2012 2013 2014

Change

from 2012

$96,7052 $96,7053 $99,611 +$2,906

_________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008; reauthorizing legislation is sought for FY 2014. 2 Reflects a reprogramming in fiscal year 2012 of $2,906 thousand from Magnet Schools Assistance to 

Advanced Placement to help address a funding shortfall in the Advanced Placement Test Fee program.

3 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Magnet Schools Assistance program (MSAP) provides grants to eligible local educational 

agencies to establish and operate magnet schools that are part of a court-ordered, agencyordered, or federally approved voluntary desegregation plan. Magnet school programs aim to 

eliminate, reduce, or prevent minority-group isolation in elementary and secondary schools 

while strengthening students' knowledge of academic subjects and their grasp of marketable 

career and technical skills. The special curriculum of a magnet school can attract substantial 

numbers of students from different social, economic, ethnic, and racial backgrounds and provide 

greater opportunities for desegregation efforts to succeed.

MSAP grantees receive awards for up to 3 years and may not receive more than $4 million per 

year. Funds must be used for activities intended to improve academic achievement and may be 

used for, among other things, planning and promotional activities; salaries of teachers and other 

instructional personnel; and acquisition of books, materials, and equipment. Expenditures for 

planning are limited to no more than 50 percent of a grant in the first year and 15 percent in the 

second and third years.

By statute, the Department gives priority for grants to applicants that demonstrate the greatest 

need for assistance, that propose to develop new magnet schools or significantly revise existing 

magnet school programs, and that use methods other than academic examinations (such as a 

lottery) to admit students. In fiscal year 2013, the Department is also giving priority to applicants 

whose projects promote science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education. In 

addition, applicants that did not receive an MSAP grant the previous fiscal year receive priority 

for any funds appropriated above $75 million.
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The Department may use up to 2 percent of an MSAP appropriation for national activities 

including evaluation, technical assistance, and dissemination of information on successful 

magnet school programs.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009....................................................................... $104,829

2010......................................................................... 100,000

2011...........................................................................99,800

2012...........................................................................96,7051 

2013...........................................................................96,7052

_________________

1 Reflects a reprogramming in fiscal year 2012 of $2,906 thousand from Magnet Schools Assistance to 

Advanced Placement to help address a funding shortfall in the Advanced Placement Test Fee program. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration requests $99.6 million for MSAP for fiscal year 2014, an increase of 

$2.9 million over the fiscal year 2012 level. The request restores to MSAP in fiscal year 2014 

the $2.9 million that was reprogrammed in fiscal year 2012 to Advanced Placement to help 

address a funding shortfall in the Advanced Placement Test Fee program. The fiscal year 2014 

appropriation would support new awards under the first year of a reauthorized program and 

continuation grant awards made under the antecedent program. The Administration’s 

Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) reauthorization proposal would strengthen 

the Federal commitment to increasing the number of high-quality educational options for parents 

and students and to increasing diversity in schools by placing a greater emphasis on funding 

magnet school programs, particularly whole-school programs, with a record of effectiveness in 

raising student achievement and reducing minority-group isolation.
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PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands) 

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Amount of awards $94,713 $93,804 $97,519

Number of new awards 0 30-40 2-4

Number of continuation awards 37 0 30-40

Range of awards $350–$4,000 $350–$4,000 $350–$4,000

Peer review of new award 

applications 0 $967 $100

National activities $1,992 $1,934 $1,992

_________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Performance Measures

This section presents selected program performance information, including, for example, GPRA 

goals, objectives, measures, and performance targets and data; and an assessment of the 

progress made toward achieving program results. Achievement of program results is based on 

the cumulative effect of the resources provided in previous years and those requested in 

FY 2014 and future years, as well as the resources and efforts invested by those served by this 

program. 

Goal: Students have access to high-quality education in desegregated magnet schools.

Objective: Federally funded magnet schools will eliminate, reduce, or prevent minority group 

isolation in targeted elementary and secondary schools with substantial proportions of minority 

group students.

Measure: The percentage of magnet schools whose student applicant pool reduces, prevents, 

or eliminates minority group isolation.

FY 2007 Cohort

Target

FY 2007 Cohort

Actual

FY 2010 Cohort

Target

FY2010 Cohort

Actual

2009 75 43

2010 80 59

2011 85.2 39.2

2012 90.1 46.4

2013 95.0

2014 100.0
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Additional information: This measure tracks, for the 2007 cohort, the percentage of magnet 

schools receiving assistance whose applicant pool reflects a racial and ethnic composition that, 

in relation to the districtwide average percentage of minority students at the same grade levels, 

reduces, prevents, or eliminates minority-group isolation. (Minority-group isolation refers to a 

condition in which minority students, including American Indians or Alaskan Natives, Asians, 

Native Hawaiians or Pacific Islanders, Hispanics, and Blacks (not of Hispanic origin), constitute 

more than 50 percent of the enrollment of a school.) In 2006, the Department established 

annual performance targets for this measure using a baseline of 58.3 percent and a goal of 

having 100 percent of schools reduce, prevent, or eliminate minority-group isolation in 2014. 

In 2010, the Department published interim final regulations for the program that provide districts 

with greater flexibility in demonstrating that their magnet or feeder schools will eliminate, reduce, 

or prevent racial group isolation and that their voluntary desegregation plans are adequate 

under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. The regulations removed the definition of “minority-group 

isolation” because it required districts to use binary racial classifications and prohibited the 

creation of magnet schools that result in minority-group enrollments in magnet and feeder 

schools that exceed the districtwide average of minority-group students. These interim final 

regulations, which were adopted as final in November 2012, apply to the 2010 cohort; as a 

result, this measure has been adjusted for those grantees to reflect the percentage of magnet 

schools that have met individually determined objectives for reducing minority group isolation, 

without reference to districtwide averages. The measure has also been adjusted to examine the 

enrollment of schools in the 2010 cohort, not the applicant pool of those schools. The 

Department is considering further revisions to the measure (and the targets for the measure) to 

align it with the new regulations.

Objective: Magnet school students meet their State's academic achievement standards.

Measure: Percentage of magnet schools whose students from major racial and ethnic groups 

meet or exceed their State's annual progress standards in reading.

Year

FY 2007 Cohort 

Target

FY 2007 Cohort 

Actual

FY 2010 Cohort 

Target

FY 2010 Cohort 

Actual

2009 81 43

2010 85 49

2011 88.4 57.3

2012 92.2 54.5

2013 96.0

2014 100.0
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Measure: Percentage of magnet schools whose students from major racial and ethnic groups 

meet or exceed their State's annual progress standards in mathematics.

Year

FY 2007 Cohort 

Target

FY 2007 Cohort 

Actual

FY 2010 Cohort 

Target

FY 2010 Cohort 

Actual

2009 81 52

2010 85 54

2011 88.5 56.7

2012 92.3 54.3

2013 96.1

2014 100.0

Additional information: These measures track the percentage of students in magnet schools 

receiving assistance who score at the proficient level or above on State assessments in reading 

and in mathematics. Performance targets for these measures are based on the ESEA goal of 

all students being proficient in reading and mathematics by 2014. 

Although the data for these measures show increases in student proficiency for the 2007 cohort, 

proficiency levels remain low. The Department is examining factors that may have influenced 

these results, such as whether projects were implemented fully or for a long enough time period 

to achieve intended effects, as well as the rigor of the magnet school curriculum and whether 

teacher training was sufficient. 

The remaining performance measures focus on sustainability and examine the percentage of 

magnet schools in operation 3 years after Federal funding ends and the percentage of magnet 

schools that meet State adequate yearly progress standards at least 3 years after Federal 

funding ends. Analysis of the sustainability data for the 2004 MSAP cohort found that nearly 

99 percent of magnet schools that received funding remained in existence in the 2009-2010 

school year and that 45 percent of those magnet schools made adequate yearly progress at the 

end of the 2009-2010 school year, roughly the same percentage that made adequate yearly 

progress at the conclusion of the grant period (46 percent).

Efficiency Measure

The Department has developed a measure to assess the efficiency of Federal investments in 

supporting magnet schools. The measure is defined as the Federal cost per student in a 

magnet school receiving assistance. Data for the 2010 cohort show an average cost of $753 

per student in 2011 and $958 per student in 2012. 

Other Performance Information

In 2008, following a year-long feasibility study, the Department initiated a national evaluation of 

magnet schools that focuses on a single category of schools receiving funding through the 

MSAP program: elementary schools that convert to become whole-school magnets. The study 

is examining the relationship of magnet conversion to outcomes for resident students (those 

who live within a magnet school’s attendance zone) and non-resident students (those who live 

outside the attendance zone but choose to attend the school). The evaluation involves fiscal 
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year 2004 and 2007 grantees and uses a comparative interrupted time series design to examine

the relationship between magnet school conversion and student achievement and other 

outcomes, including minority-group isolation in schools. The evaluation is also examining how 

factors related to student achievement vary according to characteristics of the magnet schools 

and comparison schools and includes principal and magnet school coordinator surveys. A final 

evaluation report is expected to be released in mid-2013.
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Fund for the improvement of education: programs of national significance

(Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Title V, Part D, Subpart 1)

(dollars in thousands)

FY 2014 Authorization: To be determined1

Budget Authority: 

Period of Fund Availability 2012 2013 2014

Change 

from 2012

$40,823 $40,8232 $46,276 $5,453

_______________________

1 The GEPA extension expired September 30, 2008. Reauthorizing language is sought for FY 2014. 2 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P.L. 112-175.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The Fund for the Improvement of Education (FIE) provides authority for the Department to 

support nationally significant programs to improve the quality of elementary and secondary 

education at the State and local levels and help all students meet challenging State academic 

content standards and student achievement standards. The types of programs that may be 

supported include:

• Activities to promote systemic education reform at the State and local levels, including 

scientifically based research, development, and evaluation designed to improve student 

academic achievement and strategies for effective parent and community involvement;

• Programs at the State and local levels that are designed to yield significant results, including 

programs to explore approaches to public school choice and school-based decision-making;

• Recognition programs, including financial awards to States, local educational agencies, and 

schools that have made the greatest progress in improving the academic achievement of 

economically disadvantaged students and students from major racial and ethnic minority 

groups and in closing the academic achievement gap for those groups of students farthest 

away from the proficient level on the academic assessments administered by the State;

• Scientifically based studies and evaluations of education reform strategies and innovations, 

and the dissemination of information on the effectiveness of those strategies and 

innovations;

• Activities to support Scholar-Athlete Games;

• Programs to promote voter participation in American elections; and

• Demonstrations of the effectiveness of programs under which school districts or schools 

contract with private management organizations to reform a school or schools.
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The Department may carry out activities under this authority directly or through grants and 

contracts to State or local educational agencies; institutions of higher education; and other 

public and private agencies, organizations, and institutions. Awards may be based on 

announced competitions or may support unsolicited proposals.

All funded activities must be designed so that their effectiveness is readily ascertainable and is 

assessed using rigorous research and evaluations. Each application for funds must establish 

clear objectives, which are based on research, for the proposed grant or contract and describe 

the activities the applicant will carry out in order to meet the stated objectives. The Department 

must use a peer review process to review applications for awards. Recipients of awards must 

evaluate the effectiveness of their activities and report such information as may be required to 

determine program effectiveness, and the Department must make the evaluations publicly 

available. The Department may require matching funds for activities under this program.

In fiscal year 2013, the Department is using FIE funds to support the Data Quality Initiative, 

which began in 2006 and is designed to improve the quality, analysis, and reporting of 

Department of Education elementary and secondary program data. In addition, the Department 

is using approximately $5 million in fiscal year 2013 funds to make 11 continuation grants under 

the Full-Service Community Schools program. Fiscal year 2014 continuation costs for these 

grants would be provided under the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program in the 

Supporting School Success account. In fiscal year 2013, FIE is also funding the final year of the 

Innovative Approaches to Literacy initiative, which awarded competitive grants to national

nonprofit organizations and local educational agencies (LEAs) for provision of books and 

literacy activities to children and families in high-need communities.

Funding levels for the past 5 fiscal years were:

Fiscal Year (dollars in thousands)

2009............................................ ........................ $115,9651

2010............................................ .......................... 125,4612

2011............................................ ............................ 12,009

2012............................................ ............................ 40,823

2013............................................ ............................ 40,8233

1 Includes $88,015 thousand for Congressional earmarks.

2 Includes $88,791 thousand for Congressional earmarks. 3 Excludes a 0.612 percent across-the-board increase provided in P. L. 112-175.

FY 2014 BUDGET REQUEST

The Administration is requesting $46.3 million for FIE Programs of National Significance in 

2014, an increase of $5.5 million from the 2012 level. The requested level of funding would 

allow the Department to support the following activities in 2014:

$30 million for the Improving Mathematics Achievement and Transition to College from High 

School (IMATCH) program, a grant competition focused on developing, evaluating, and 
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scaling effective practices that can help increase student achievement in mathematics 

during the transition from the last two years of high school through the first two years of 

college. This competition, to be jointly administered with the National Science Foundation 

(NSF), would generate new evidence about effective interventions for improving students’ 

math achievement and engagement, in accordance with the joint ED–NSF evidence 

standards that have been recently developed. NSF began work on this initiative in 2013. A 

portion of these funds would also be used to conduct a program-level evaluation. 

$10 million for the cross-agency Disconnected Youth Initiative, which would strengthen 

services and improve outcomes for disconnected youth (defined as individuals, ages 14-24, 

who are neither employed nor enrolled in an educational institution or who are at high-risk of 

dropping out of high school). This initiative, which also would be supported through a 

$5 million proposal in the Department’s Disability Innovation Fund and a $10 million request 

for the Department of Labor’s Workforce Innovation Fund, may include activities to support 

the development of Performance Partnerships pilots, which would give States and localities 

enhanced flexibility in administering Federal youth-serving programs in exchange for greater 

accountability for results, as well as Pay for Success projects and evaluations.

Since March 2012, the Interagency Forum on Disconnected Youth (IFDY), led by the 

Department of Education, has helped to lay a strong foundation for future pilots and to 

explore how Federal agencies can better support State and local efforts to serve this 

population. The IFDY will continue to reach out to stakeholders in 2013 to determine the 

best possible uses of the Performance Partnerships Pilot authority.

The Department would use the funds provided in FIE to address issues such as (1) our 

limited knowledge of which program models are most effective in helping disconnected 

youth achieve positive outcomes; (2) a relative lack of attention to this population at the 

Federal, State, and local levels; and (3) the need for more comprehensive approaches to 

meeting the multi-faceted needs of youth who may have educational deficits, unstable 

housing, health challenges, and histories of involvement with the criminal justice system. 

$5 million for a Youth Data Pilot that would enhance communities’ tracking of and 

performance on multiple outcomes for at-risk youth using existing data sets. This initiative 

would support communities that seek to gain a comprehensive picture of the progress of 

their youth towards healthy, productive lives by looking across multiple data sources at a 

variety of outcomes, such as high school attendance and graduation rates, postsecondary 

enrollment and credentials, employment, incarceration rates, birth outcomes, and shelter 

stays. Activities might include establishing common indicators of youth success, integrating 

administrative data sources, and developing easy-to-understand scorecards to help drive 

decision-making. All activities would be done in compliance with the Family Educational 

Rights and Privacy Act. Policymakers, community leaders, and other stakeholders will be 

able to use these tools to improve or reassess a community’s service delivery models and 

redirect resources into the most effective strategies and programs. This could also enable 

local, regional, and national benchmarking. 
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Funds would support this work by (1) sponsoring a prize or challenge for leading-edge 

communities to demonstrate how to make data on youth outcomes easily accessible across 

a range of indicators and how to use that data to secure community-wide commitments to 

set concrete goals for improvement on those outcome indicators while protecting student 

privacy, and (2) providing planning grants and technical assistance to communities that are 

just starting the work of developing common indicators and integrating administrative data to 

better track and use data on youth outcomes. The Department of Education will work 

closely with the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Justice on planning 

and implementing this cross-sector initiative.

$1.3 million to continue the Data Quality Initiative (DQI), which is designed to improve the 

quality, analysis, and reporting of the Department’s elementary and secondary program 

performance data. The DQI contractor provides program office staff with guidance on how 

to structure grant competitions so as to encourage grantees to plan for and collect highquality program performance and evaluation data; provides technical assistance to grantees 

as they collect the data; and provides assistance to program offices and program analysis 

staff to improve the quality of data analysis.

PROGRAM OUTPUT MEASURES (dollars in thousands)

Measures 2012 2013 2014

Full-Service Community Schools grants:

2008 grantees (10 awards) $4,596 0 0

2010 grantees (11 awards) 5,138 $5,424 01

Subtotal 10,094 5,424 01

Data Quality Initiative 1,298 1,276 $1,276

Education Facilities Clearinghouse 732 0 0

STEM Initiative 0 0 29,700

Innovative Approaches to Literacy 28,600 29,000 0

Disconnected Youth Initiative 0 0 9,950

Youth Data Pilot 0 0 5,000

Peer review of new award applications 99 0 350

Other activities 0 5,123 0

Total 40,823 40,823 46,276 ___________________________

NOTE: 2013 excludes the 0.612 across-the-board increase provided for in P.L. 112-175. 1 Fiscal year 2014 continuation costs of approximately $5,344 thousand would be covered under the request for 

21st Century Community Learning Centers.

PROGRAM PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act contains specific accountability provisions for FIE 

grantees. Each application for funds must include clear objectives for the project that are based 
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on scientifically-based research and must describe the activities to be carried out to meet those 

objectives. In addition, recipients must evaluate the effectiveness of their funded programs and 

submit evaluations to the Department. The Department has not established general 

performance measures for the program, but does establish measures for specific grant 

competitions and monitors the progress of the grantees against these measures.

• For the Education Facilities Clearinghouse, the performance measure is the percentage of 

recipients of clearinghouse onsite training or technical assistance that implement one or 

more changes to improve their education facility based upon clearinghouse 

recommendations within 6 months of the training or technical assistance. Baseline data 

(corresponding to the 2012 performance period for the Clearinghouse grantee) are as 

follows: 62.5 percent, or five out of eight, recipients of clearinghouse onsite training or 

technical assistance implemented one or more changes to improve their education facility 

based on clearinghouse recommendations within 6 months of the training or technical 

assistance. More specifically, 100 percent (2 out of 2) of recipients of clearinghouse onsite 

training met this measure, and 50 percent (3 out of 6) recipients of clearinghouse technical 

assistance met this measure.

• For Full-Service Community Schools, the measure is the percentage of individuals targeted 

for services who receive services during each year of the project period. All grantees must 

submit an annual performance report documenting their contribution in assisting the 

Department in measuring the performance of the program against this indicator, as well as 

performance on project-specific indicators. In 2008, 96.3 percent of targeted individuals 

received services. In 2009, 100 percent of targeted individuals received services. In 2010, 

98 percent of targeted individuals for the 2008 cohort received services; 100 percent of 

targeted individuals for the 2010 cohort received services. The Department expects to have 

performance data for 2011 in fall 2013.

• For the Innovative Approaches to Literacy initiative, the performance measures are: (1) the 

percentage of 4-year-old children participating in the project who achieve significant gains in 

oral language skills; (2) the percentage of participating 3rd-grade students who meet or 

exceed proficiency on State reading or language arts assessments; (3) the percentage of 

participating 8th-grade students who meet or exceed proficiency on State reading or 

language arts assessments; and (4) the percentage of participating high school students 

who meet or exceed proficiency on State reading or language arts assessments. The 

Department expects to have performance data available in fall 2013.

• In fiscal year 2010, the Department awarded a grant to support improvement of students’ 

financial literacy. The grantee will report on the percentage of participating students who 

achieve an educationally significant improvement in their understanding of personal finance; 

the percentage of participating low-income students who complete the Free Application for 

Federal Student Aid (FAFSA); and the percentage of participating low-income students who 

enroll in college. The Department expects to make this report available in fall 2013.

State tables*