NC a finalist for huge education grant

Some encouraging news for North Carolina schools.

The U.S. Department of Education announced Thursday that our state is one of 16 finalists vying for billions of dollars in stimulus funds. One local superintendent says there’s no shortage of programs that need a boost.

“If you ask any educator, any administrator, any teacher, they always say we could use more,” Whiteville City Schools Superintendent, Tom Hager said.

That’s why the news that North Carolina was selected as one of 15 other states and the District of Columbia, for the “Race to the Top” program was so well received.

“We know we’ve got some problems with the state budget in the year to come,” Hager said, “If we can find some additional dollars, we can alleviate some of those problems.”

In total, 41 states applied for a piece of the four billion dollar grant that’s part of the stimulus bill. The application process required states to plan out how to turn around the lowest performing schoools, outline past reform successes and outline how to continue that reform to make students more college ready.

“Many universities and colleges are complaining about kids who are coming not really prepared,” Superintendent Hager said, “We need to make sure our kids are prepared to achieve that first year they step in to college.”

The finalists were chosen by panels of five who read and scored each application. Just how much money the winner will recieve, and how that state school system can spend it, is still unclear. That’s expected to be outlined when the winners are chosen next month.

North Carolina has 115 school districts. 85 of the state’s 100 counties are classified as rural. One of those is Columbus County.

To see North Carolina’s “Race to the Top” application, you can visit www.ed.gov.