Turnarounds: A Big Week For Obama's SIG Program

Down in Tampa at the Title I (NASTID) conference they're talking about how to help districts make good decisions with their SIG money and supervise the work that's being done.  I'm hoping to get a report from there later today or tomorrow.  Up in Washington there are two events -- one at Fordham on Feb 2 (RSVP here) or watch online and the other at CAP on February 4 here. Last week at the stakeholder meeting the USDE revealed that there's a map coming of turnaround efforts nationwide (StakeholderMemo courtesy Washington Partners).  Meanwhile, reports are leaking out that districts are gaming the SIG system by swapping principals between two failing schools, or by hiring an executive principal above the principal, or foisting the weak "transformation" model on a principal who might, given his or her own choice, go for an option that allowed for restaffing the school, or freezing out community groups and charter networks who want to help fix broken schools.   Will districts use the federal money to do smart, new things or will they do as little as possible and keep within their comfort zones?