http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog Advance Illinois | Blog Thu, 01 Jul 2010 16:36:38 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Advance Illinois opposes recent efforts in the U.S. House of Representatives to strip $500 million from the Race to the Top, along with other cuts to reform initiatives.  Executive Director Robin Steans urged lawmakers to reject these efforts. "While we appreciate federal efforts to prevent further painful cuts in schools across ... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/race-to-the-top-reforms-threatened-by-jobs-bill Illinois has stepped up again in the "Race to the Top," the U.S. Department of Education's competitive grant program. Today was the deadline for States to file their applications for Phase 2 of the Race, which could bring up to $400 million to Illinois to help drive reforms. Today, Gov. Quinn ... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/race-to-the-top-phase-2 Statement of Robin Steans, Advance Illinois Executive Director: Illinois should be proud it produced such a strong Race to the Top application, which earned national recognition for its 'groundbreaking' supporting legislation, 'standout' support from stakeholders and a thorough plan. The team that represented Illinois during the interview process performed admirably ... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/illinois-a-proud-5th-in-race-to-the-top Delaware and Tennessee have won Phase 1 of the $4.35 billion Race to the Top competition.   The DoE announced the winners by twitter today.  Read more in the WSJ.   Illinois was a finalist, and will now start the work toward Phase 2. http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/congratulations-to-delaware-and-tennessee Illinois scores on national reading tests remained flat in 2009, an indication that transformative reform is needed for the state's schools.  Performance on these tests, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), have been flat for several years.  Achievement gaps have also remained essentially the ... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/naep-scores-flat-in-illinois-us-cities-improve Advance Illinois Senior Policy Associate Ben Boer contributed to the Education Sector's running blog "Five Principles for Smarter Data Systems."   Ben makes the point that good data and a strong assessment system should work together in  feedback loop, with strong data feeding sound assessments, and the results from the assessments ... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/smarter-data-systems-better-schools Congratulations to Illinois for being named one of the 16 Race to the Top finalists.  State leaders and lawmakers should be proud of their hard work and smart leadership over the past year. Good luck to the team going to do the finalist interview in Washington.  Here is the statement ... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/illinois-a-race-to-the-top-finalist Illinois was one of six states chosen for a new multi-state initiative to "clear hurdles that have hindered previous attempts to improve underperforming schools." Read more in EdWeek (article access compliments of edweek.org) or read the press release from MassInsight, which is leading the project. http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/illinois-joins-six-state-turnaround-effort The Data Quality Campaign awarded 4 state education leaders the "State Policymakers of the Year" award for "their critical leadership role in supporting comprehensive legislation requiring the development of a statewide longitudinal data system."  Read more... http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/illinois-education-leaders-win-national-award The Obama administration is proposing a sweeping overhaul of President Bush's signature education law, No Child Left Behind.  Read more in the New York Times and the National Journal. You can also read the U.S. Dept of Education press release and the budget page on ed.gov. http://www.advanceillinois.org/blog/obama-proposes-nclb-overhaul-in-2010