Today, the U.S. Department of Education made $437 million in Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) grant applications available for school districts, non profits and states. TIF grants support local projects that reward teachers, principals and other school personnel who improve student achievement. States, districts and non-profits partnering with states or districts are eligible to apply. Applications are due July 6th and grants will be awarded in September 2010.

“As superintendent of Chicago Public Schools, I learned firsthand how TIF grants can prompt districts to create ways to reward success and drive reform,” said Duncan. “We want to scale up this promising program so we can recognize great teachers, principals and other school personnel who are working hard and raising student achievement.”

The Department will be awarding approximately $437 million in new TIF grants this fall. These funds are available through both the ARRA and the FY 2010 appropriations. Applicants for these funds must meet TIF program and eligibility requirements including:

• Program must reward teachers and principals that improve student achievement using fair and transparent evaluations based on multiple measures including student growth.
• Program must demonstrate that there is a high level of local educator support and involvement.
• Program must demonstrate that there is a plan for financial sustainability after the 5 year grant award period.
• Programs must demonstrate that they are implementing performance based compensation as part of a coherent and integrated strategy for strengthening the educator workforce.
• Program must serve high needs schools.

TIF applicants will receive additional points if they meet the following criteria:

• Program will use “a value add” measure of the impact of teachers and/ or principals on student growth
• Program demonstrates that it is designed to attract effective teachers to hard to staff subject or specialty areas or to serve high needs students in high needs schools.
• Program is a new applicant

The TIF program will hold two separate competitions— the Main TIF competition and the TIF Evaluation competition. Both competitions will utilize the same aforementioned criteria. The Department is running a separate TIF evaluation competition in order to identify applicants willing to participate in a rigorous evaluation of the impact of performance based compensation on student achievement in high need schools. TIF Evaluation competition applicants will be required to meet additional criteria and will be eligible for at least an additional $1 million over the 5 year grant period. The Department will select winners for the TIF Evaluation competition first and then allow anyone who did not win the TIF Evaluation to compete for the Main TIF competition.

TIF began in 2006 and currently supports 33 grant sites in 18 states and has been implemented in 109 school districts, including charter school districts. The current program impacts approximately 55,000 teachers and 2,500 principals. The estimated range of awards is between $5,000,000- $10,000,000 and the Department expects to award approximately 40-80 grants.

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