Race+to+the+Top+Impacts+All+Students

﻿  Obama's Race to the Top Impacts All Students

The effects on general education students  and students with special needs

By: Allie Eder, Ashley Mahoney, & Brittany Long

﻿All students, both general education and special needs, will benefit from what Race to the Top has to offer.
 * There are new standards that students must meet while in school. This will well prepare each student for college and their workplaces.


 * Students will be able to take and interact with online tests. These tests can be taken several times during the school year. The results can be used by both the student and the teacher to identify where the student may be struggling or exceling. The data gathered can be used to help make modifications and accomodations in the classroom to help ensure the success of that student.


 * Free SAT tests will be allowed to all 11th grade students, to ensure that they have all the access and tools that they need in order to apply to colleges and universities. The tests are free regardless of the students' income.


 * More STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) courses will be integrated into the school curriculum. These courses will allow students to be more hands-on with in the classroom and give them the opportunity to work alongside those that are well-experienced within that field.


 * The teachers that these students have will be well experienced. They have received incresed training on how to make their classes more interesting, relevant, and challenging.

Grou﻿ps Say Race to Top Overlooked ELL Pupils
 * Several Civil Rights groups are infuriated because they claim the United States Department of Education neglected to give the English-language learners the appropriate attention during the state-grant competition for $4 billion (Zehr, 2010).


 * Roger L. Rice states, "The application for winners rarely mentioned English-language learners, except in passing and rarely fleshed out any thought to how they were going to close the achievement gap for ELLs (Zehr, 2010)."


 * ﻿The states were required to show improvement in students academic achievements since 2003 to qualify for the state- grant. The states where also supposed to show documented data displaying the closing of the achievement gap between ELL students and English speaking students. This aspect was overlooked when the state-grant was given (Zehr, 2010).


 * Massachusetts was one of the state grant winners. They were scored on "improving student outcomes," "Demonstrating significant progress in raising achieveemtn and closing gaps," and "Making progress in each reform area." However; Massachusetts achievement gap between English speaking students, and ELL students has widened since 2003. Massachusetts neglected to provide their reading scores from a state wide assessment completed in 2009 that demonstrated a larger gap between the ELL students and the English Speaking students(Zehr, 2010).


 * The U.S. Education Department responded to Rice's arguments by stating that this round of $4 billion state grants was a learning process. More attention will be given to the ELL students in the future (Zehr, 2010).


 * 11 states and the District of Columbia were awarded the $4 billion state grants. As a whole, all of these areas educate about 873,000 English Langauge Learners. This is estimated to be only 16 percent of the nations ELL students (Zehr, 2010).

Race to the Top Requirements that also Benefit the Students
 * Race to the Top strives to make students prepared for college. The government no longer wants students to be placed in remedial college courses after recieving a diploma. Students who graduate high school should be able to test into more challenging college courses. It is clear high schools are not properly preparing their students for college.
 * Race to the Top strives to create high-quality assessments that students are prepared to pass.
 * Race to the Top requires higher-education institutes to partner with state school systems to ensure assessments and standards are fashioned so students are prepared for college upon graduation.
 * Common Core State Standards are standards that will be used nationwide to ensure all curriculums are teaching the appropriate material across the country. Forty-eight states have already adopted this standards system.

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"America will not succeed in the 21st century unless we do a far better job of educating our sons and daughters...And the race starts today. I am issuing a challeneg to our nation's governors and school boards, prinipals and teachers, businesses and non-profits, parents and students: if you set and enforce rigorous and challenging standards and assessments; if you put outstanding teachers at the front of the classroom; if you turn around failing schools- your state can wina Race to the Top grant that will not only help stduents outcompete workers around the world, but let them fulfill their God-given potential." President Barack Obama  July 24, 2009

[] This video and its facts are from the Maryland State Department of Education. Nancy Grasmick explains what Race to the Top means for students and what is expected from them.

"Grading Obama's Education Policy"

During President Obama's election campaign he had many plans for education, including Race to the Top. He wanted to accomplish:


 * There would no longer be a threat of privatization.


 * "Curricula would no longer be simply made of low-level facts to be mastered for seemingly mindless tests," (Apple, 2011, p. 24).


 * Teachers will not have to focus on teaching students content in preparation for tests.


 * "Poor children of color would no longer be so overrepresented in special education classes, shunted there as an excuse for not dealing with the realities of racism in the large society," (Apple, 2011, p.24).


 * Schools will receive all the resources that they will need as support when dealing with loss of jobs, increase in impoverishment, lack of health care, high rates of incarceration, and loss of hope within surrounding communities.

What has President Obama accomplished thus far. ..


 * Schools are given more credit for rasing student achievement, regardless if the school's average scores do not meet AYP.


 * Shaming schools has been lessened.


 * There isn't an agenda of privatizing all of our main public institutions.

This is what President Obama has accomplished so far during his term in office, the rest is just left as hope for the future. (Apple,2011)

References: Achieve, I. c. (2010). Sustaining the Race to the Top Reforms. Race to the Top: Accelerating College and Career Readiness in States. //Achieve, Inc//, Retrieved from EBSCO//host//. Achieve, I. c. (2010). Standards and Assessments. Race to the Top: Accelerating College and Career Readiness in States. //Achieve, Inc//, Retrieved from EBSCO//host//. Apple, M W. (2011). Grading obama's education policy. //The Progressive,//24-27. Retrieved from Acadmic Search Premier/ EBSCO//host.//

Dr. M. (2009). Race to the Top.... What does it all mean? Retrieved from google.

Obama, B. (2009). Promoting Inovation, Reform, and Excellence in America's Public Schools. Retrieved from google.

Zehr, M. (2010). Groups Say Race to Top Overlooked ELL Pupils. //Education Week//, 30(6), 18-19. Retrieved from EBSCO//host//.