Race to the Top: Accelerating College and Career Readiness in States - Postsecondary

The Historic Opportunity to Get College Readiness Right: The Race to the Top Fund and Postsecondary Education Passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) and the creation of the Race to the Top (RTTT) Fund in early 2009 provide states (SEAs) and local school districts (LEAs) with an historic opportunity to develop and implement dramatic reforms to improve the rate at which students graduate ready for college and careers. For cash‐strapped states, the $4.35 billion available through RTTT can infuse unprecedented federal resources into college readiness efforts. As colleges and universities aggressively seek to reduce expenditures, protect access and affordability, and promote student persistence and success, RTTT is a direct way to ensure more students enter postsecondary education with the knowledge and skills to succeed – thereby decreasing the amount of money spent on developmental education. No state is guaranteed to win a grant from the RTTT Fund, and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has made clear he will evaluate states’ proposals against highly rigorous standards. Successful applications will demonstrate that states have redoubled their efforts to boost high school expectations and improve assessments but also to tackle other roadblocks – such as weak use of data, inequitably distributed teachers, and chronically low‐achieving schools – that have impeded progress towards college‐ and career‐ready success. To be competitive for RTTT funding, states must demonstrate their commitment to four building blocks, or assurances: standards and assessments, data systems to support instruction, great teachers and leaders, and turning around the lowest‐achieving schools. States’ applications must describe how the SEA and participating LEAs intend to use RTTT funds to implement comprehensive and coherent policies and practices across the four education assurances, and how these reforms are designed to increase student achievement, reduce the achievement gap across student subgroups, and increase the rates at which students who graduate from high school are prepared for college and careers.1 While the four RTTT assurances are directed primarily at improving K‐12 systems, postsecondary institutions have a unique opportunity to partner with SEAs and LEAs to ensure that the reforms implemented will help more students successfully prepare for college, as well as to provide expertise based on research and best practice. Postsecondary institutions should also seize the opportunity to provide the leadership needed to overcome historical barriers to collaboration between K‐12 and higher education for the development of successful P‐20 systems. This guide is one of a series of papers Achieve has prepared to help states maximize the opportunities presented through the Race to the Top Fund (RTTT). In accompanying papers, Achieve addresses recommendations for leveraging P‐20 longitudinal data systems, turning around low performing schools, and improving teacher effectiveness. Taken together, these papers offer advice to help state leaders develop comprehensive RTTT reform strategies firmly anchored in the goal of college and career readiness for all students. The full set of RTTT papers is available at http://www.achieve.org/RacetotheTop.

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To read the full set of program requirements and the final application, visit www.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop.