U. S. D E P A R T M E N T OF E D U C A T I O N

Reward Excellence and

Promote Innovation

Every child in America deserves a world-class education.

Today, more than ever, a world-class education is a 

prerequisite for success. America was once the best educated 

nation in the world. A generation ago, we led all nations in 

college completion, but today, 10 countries have passed us. 

It is not that their students are smarter than ours. It is that 

these countries are being smarter about how to educate their 

students. And the countries that out-educate us today will 

out-compete us tomorrow.

We must do better. Together, we must achieve a new goal, 

that by 2020, the United States will once again lead the world 

in college completion. We must raise the expectations for 

our students, for our schools, and for ourselves—this must 

be a national priority. We must ensure that every student 

graduates from high school well prepared for college and a 

career.

 

President Barack Obama

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Reward Excellence and

Reward Excellence and 

Promote Innovation

Reauthorizing the Elementary and 

Secondary Education Act

To help achieve President Obama’s stated goal of providing 

a world-class education to every child in America, the 

administration has designed a blueprint for a reenvisioned 

federal role in education through the reauthorization of the

Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). The new ESEA 

will raise the bar for and reward excellence in performance, and 

promote innovative and continuous improvement in schools.

Raising the Bar and Rewarding 

Excellence

This compound strategy for creating a world-class education uses 

a three-pronged approach in the proposed reauthorization:

Fostering a Race to the Top. Modeled after the Race to the 

Top program authorized by the American Recovery and 

Reinvestment Act of 2009, the proposal will continue Race to the 

Top’s incentives for systemic reforms by providing competitive 

grants to states and school districts to take on ambitious 

and comprehensive reforms, and to encourage the broad 

identification, dissemination, adoption, and use of effective 

policies and practices. State and school district grantees will 

be required to develop and implement comprehensive plans, in 

Promote Innovation
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collaboration with other stakeholders, to dramatically improve 

student outcomes, including: focusing on rigorous college- and 

career-ready standards and high-quality assessments; providing 

better information to families to help them evaluate and improve 

their children’s schools, and to educators to help them improve 

their students’ learning; supporting effective teachers and school 

leaders; turning around persistently low-performing schools; and 

supporting innovative models for reform.

States and school districts that receive grants may spend funds 

flexibly in a manner aligned with their plans, but states must 

award at least 50 percent of their grant funds to school districts 

that participate in the state plan. Grantees will be required 

to meet specific annual performance targets related to the 

implementation of their plans and to improving measurable 

outcomes for students and schools, and will receive continuation 

funding only if they implement their proposed plans effectively 

and meet their performance targets. Grantees must invest in 

rigorous evaluation of their ongoing performance and reform 

efforts.

Supporting effective public school choice. The administration 

will support the expansion of high-performing public charter 

schools and other autonomous public schools by providing 

competitive grants to states, charter school authorizers, 

charter management organizations, districts, and nonprofit 

organizations, to start or expand high-performing public charter 

schools and other high-performing autonomous public schools, 
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with a priority for applicants proposing to start or expand 

high-performing public charter schools, The proposal also 

supports local communities as they expand public school choice 

options for students within and across school districts through 

competitive grants to districts, consortia of districts, and states 

in partnership with districts to expand high-quality public 

school educational options for students, especially students in 

low-performing schools, and ensure that students and families 

are aware of these options. Finally, the proposal will continue to 

provide competitive grants to districts to support magnet schools 

under a desegregation plan ordered by a federal court, state 

court, or other authorized state agency or official, or approved 

by the secretary. The reauthorized program will expand and 

improve options for students and increase diversity by placing 

a greater emphasis on funding whole-school magnet school 

programs or models that have a record of success in raising 

student academic achievement and reducing minority group 

isolation.

Promoting a culture of college readiness and success. Access 

to a challenging high school curriculum has a greater impact on 

whether a student will earn a four-year college degree than his or 

her high school test scores, class rank, or grades. The proposed 

reauthorization will increase access to college-level, dual credit, 

and other accelerated courses in high-need schools and support 

college-going strategies and models that will help students 

succeed.
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Promoting Innovation and 

Continuous Improvement

This strategy for ensuring a world-class education for America’s 

students relies on three approaches, which will be funded under 

the new reauthorization proposal.
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Fostering innovation and accelerating success. The Investing 

in Innovation Fund (i3) builds on the i3 program launched 

through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, 

and will provide additional competitive grants to expand the 

implementation of, and investment in, innovative and evidencebased practices, programs, and strategies that significantly 

improve student outcomes. The secretary will use a rigorous, 

three-tiered evidence framework that directs the highest levels 

of funding to programs with the strongest evidence, and also 

provides significant support for promising programs that are 

willing to undergo rigorous evaluation. Grantees will use funds 

to: scale up practices, strategies, or programs for which there is 

strong evidence of success in significantly closing achievement 

gaps between groups of students and in significantly increasing 

student academic achievement for all groups of students; validate 

and expand practices, strategies, or programs for which there 

is moderate evidence of success; or develop and test promising 

practices, strategies, or programs for which there is potential 

and some research-based support. Each grantee will be required 

to conduct or participate in an independent evaluation of its 

project. Grantees will be required to form partnerships with the 

private sector to secure matching funds.
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Supporting, recognizing, and rewarding local innovations. 

The administration’s proposal will encourage and support local 

innovation by creating fewer, larger, more flexible funding 

streams around areas integral to student success, giving states 

and districts flexibility to focus on local needs. New competitive 

funding streams will provide greater flexibility, reward results, 

and ensure that federal funds are used wisely. At the same time, 

districts will have fewer restrictions on blending funds from 

different categories with less red tape.

Supporting student success. Tackling persistent achievement 

gaps requires public agencies, community organizations, and 

families to share responsibility for improving outcomes for 

We ’re making a big phi losophica l and 

strategic change with these grants. 

We ’re mo ving away from formu la 

grants—where e verybody gets a litt le 

money—and to competiti ve ones where 

we can support peop le doing the 

best work. ... We want our scarce 

resources to le verage dramatic change, 

change that wi l l acce lerate progress 

for decades to come. ... The goa l for 

the Race to the Top and In vesting 

in Inno vation funds is to reward 

app licants that ha ve the courage, 

capacity, and commitment to reform—

rea l progress for chi ldren is what we 

care about.

—U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, Remarks to the 

 National School Boards Association, Feb. 1, 2010
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students. The proposal will prioritize programs that include a 

comprehensive redesign of the school day, week, or year, that 

promote schools as the center of their communities, or that 

partner with community organizations. The proposal also will 

invest in new models that keep students safe, supported, and 

healthy both in and out of school, and that support strategies 

to better engage families and community members in their 

children’s education.

For all students to thrive in the classroom, in college, and in 

a career, our educational system must continuously develop 

and embrace the very best practices, policies, and ideas. 

This administration will ask policymakers and educators 

at all levels to carefully analyze the impact of their policies, 

practices, and systems on student outcomes. 

This publication is in the public domain and may be reproduced in 

whole or in part. It comprises excerpts from A Blueprint for Reform: 

The Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, 

U.S. Department of Education, March 2010. To read the full text, visit 

www2.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/blueprint.

For more information, visit www.ed.gov or call 1-800-USA-LEARN.

May 2010
 The Department of Education’s mission is to 

promote student achievement and preparation for 

global competitiveness by fostering educational 

excellence and ensuring equal access.

www.ed.gov