i3 projects

Ed Week reporter Christina Samuels reminded me that the US Department of Education has announced awards under the “Investing in Innovation Fund” (“i3″ program). There are substantial funds for cooperative agreements or grants aimed at promoting practices with demonstrated benefits.

Program Description: The Investing in Innovation Fund, established under section 14007 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), provides funding to support (1) local educational agencies (LEAs), and (2) nonprofit organizations in partnership with (a) one or more LEAs or (b) a consortium of schools. The purpose of this program is to provide competitive grants to applicants with a record of improving student achievement and attainment in order to expand the implementation of, and investment in, innovative practices that are demonstrated to have an impact on improving student achievement or student growth, closing achievement gaps, decreasing dropout rates, increasing high school graduation rates, or increasing college enrollment and completion rates.

These grants will (1) allow eligible entities to expand and develop innovative practices that can serve as models of best practices, (2) allow eligible entities to work in partnership with the private sector and the philanthropic community, and (3) identify and document best practices that can be shared and taken to scale based on demonstrated success.

I’m regularly a little wary about “innovation,” as an interest in what’s “new” or “innovative” too often trumps the employment of well-established (“old school”) practices that have a documented track record for success. Let’s hope that the track records for these innovations are actually well established. Also, let’s hope the US Department of Ed applies a level of scrutiny to them that at least approximates the evaluation that it focused on the Reading First initiatives.

Although Ms. Samuels focused her analysis on projects that fit with special education (a sensible take, given that special ed is her beat), there are many others. Readers can see a complete list of the funded projects on a site provided by the department by following this link and learn about the program by following this one.