To be eligible for a portion of $200 to $400 million in Race to the Top money (should Ohio win), Local Education Agencies (LEAs) – school districts and charter schools – were required to submit memorandums of understanding (MOUs) to the Ohio Department of Education by last week.
We previously speculated on Flypaper that Ohio, unlike states with more contentious applications, might see hundreds of LEAs signing up. This, in turn, might threaten to diminish the intention of Race to the Top, as spreading funds far and wide across the state would result in very few dollars with which districts could make any real changes.
Indeed, over a third (250) of Ohio’s 613 districts signed the MOU, including many large urban districts -- Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Toledo, and Akron. (It’s a shame that Dayton [facing a $5 million hole in its budget] and Youngstown [the state’s lowest performing school district] decided to sit this one out.) Of 332 charter schools, 187 signed on to the provisions of Race to the Top.
In terms of student enrollment, the discrepancy between districts and charter schools is stark. If Ohio wins a portion of Race to the Top funding, 46 percent of students enrolled in district public schools attend a school eligible for the money, compared to 72 percent of students enrolled in charter schools. The graphs below show that a far larger share of children in the state’s charters than in district schools have administrators that have signed the state’s Race to the Top memorandum of understanding.
