The U.S. Department of Education on Tuesday named nine states and Washington, D.C., winners in Race to the Top, the federal $4.35 billion education reform competition. Among 36 applicants, Maine placed 33rd in the competition.

The list of 10 winners included two New England states: first-place Massachusetts and fifth-place Rhode Island. On a 500-point scale, those states won 471 and 451 points, respectively.

Maine, which was competing for up to $75 million to advance education reforms, scored 283.4 out of 500. Only Mississippi, Montana and Alabama had lower scores, according to a full results list released by the Department of Education.

Maine proposed in its application to scale up a number of existing educational initiatives, including the non-profit Jobs for Maine Graduates program; standards-based education, a system in which students advance at their own pace, once they’ve mastered particular academic skills; and the Maine Learning Technology Initiative, the state program that equips all seventh- and eighth-grade students, along with a majority of high schoolers, with Apple laptops.

The application, however, contained a number of typographical errors and failed to garner the support of a majority of school districts. It attracted the support of even fewer local teachers’ unions.

The Department of Education this week will release detailed score cards for each state’s application, allowing the public to see evaluators’ comments and state scores in each competitive category.

The Race to the Top competition put an emphasis on Obama administration priorities to link teacher evaluations to students’ academic performance, aggressively collect data on student outcomes, implement rigorous academic standards and turn around the lowest-performing schools — including by encouraging the proliferation of charter schools, which aren’t allowed by Maine law.


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