New York Receives $700 Million In Race To The Top Funding

By Mike Connery on 08/25/2010 @ 12:24 PM

Tags: Race To The Top, Education, Senate Democrats, Suzi Oppenheimer, SD-37, Darrel Aubertine, SD-48

New York has placed second among 16 states in the federal Race To The Top funding competition, awarding the state with $700 million over four years to help build a statewide system for tracking student progress and implementing a new statewide curriculum.

The hard work of the Democratic Senate Majority is largely responsible for New York attaining these funds. After placing 15th among 16 finalists in the first round, The New York Senate Dems passed legislation that lifted the cap on charter schools to 460 from 200, links teacher evaluations to student performance, and brings more local school districts and unions on board.

Senator Suzi Oppenheimer who chairs the Senate Education Committee, sponsored the landmark reforms that paved the way for the victory.

"I was confident that if we all came together, we could transform our state’s educational policies to enrich the learning experience for all students, while bolstering our application for this extremely competitive grant program. Achieving consensus on the necessary reforms was not easy," Sen. Oppenheimer said.

The announcement that New York State will receive funds means public school districts throughout the entire state will see increased funding. New York City's public schools are set to receive hundreds of millions of dollars, while schools upstate will receive much needed cash as well.

“This funding could not come at a better time considering the difficult decisions made to close a $9 billion budget gap. Add that to the $600 million from the federal government’s jobs bill and we are looking at significant restorations for our schools,” said Sen. Darrel Aubertine.