Five Finalists Named For $1 Million Education Award
The Broad Foundation has announced the five finalists for The Broad Prize for Urban Education, a $1 million prize awarded to the most outstanding urban school districts in the nation.
The prize identifies the best practices in education innovation and improvement. The winner, to be announced in September 2003, will be awarded $500,000, and each of the four finalists will receive $125,000.
The five finalist school districts competing for the prize are:
Boston Public Schools (Mass.)
Garden Grove Unified School District (Calif.)
Jefferson County Public Schools (Louisville, Kent.)
Long Beach Unified School District (Calif.)
Norfolk Public Schools (Va.)
“These five districts demonstrate our nation’s most successful efforts in raising student achievement and closing the ethnic and income achievement gaps,” said Eli Broad, founder of The Broad Foundation. “These school systems are models of educational innovation, resourcefulness and dedication, and it is critical that we recognize this success and share their strategies with educators and the public across the country.”
The Broad Prize combines the spirit of the Pulitzer Prize and the reward of the Nobel Prize by serving not only as an incentive for excellence, but also providing a generous monetary reward of over $1,000,000 to highlight this achievement.
The Prize is awarded to the urban school districts making the greatest overall improvement in student achievement while at the same time beginning to reduce the achievement gap across ethnic groups and between high and low income students.
The cash awards to the prizewinner and four finalists will fund scholarships for students to attend college or other post-secondary training.
Last year’s inaugural Broad Prize was awarded to The Houston Independent School District. Scholarship recipients from Houston and the other finalist districts will be announced in May 2003.
The Broad Prize for Urban Education is designed to:
— Regain the American public’s confidence in public schools by spotlighting districts making significant gains in student achievement.
— Create an incentive to dramatically increase student achievement in our nation’s largest urban school districts.
— Reward public school systems that are successfully using creative, results-oriented approaches and techniques to better educate children.
In addition to the cash award, the winner of The Broad Prize for Urban Education will be showcased nationwide over the following year. The winning school districts’ best instruction and management practices will be spotlighted so that other urban school systems can learn about and adopt successful practices.
The process to select the winner of The Broad Prize for Urban Education involves four steps:
1. Over 100 U.S. urban school districts were identified as eligible candidates.
2. A Review Board, comprised of 20 prominent education leaders from across the country — with the help of the National Center for Educational Accountability (NCEA) — analyzed extensive quantitative data and used their collective knowledge and experience to determine the finalists.
3. Under NCEA’s guidance, a team of researchers and practitioners will conduct site visits to each finalist district in May and June to gather additional quantitative and qualitative data and meet with each district’s school board, superintendent and union leaders.
4. A Selection Jury will meet this summer to review the information collected on the site visits and information considered by the review board to select one district as the winner of the annual Broad Prize for Urban Education.
The Selection Jury is comprised of leaders in business, government and philanthropy. The jury includes:
Henry Cisneros, CEO of American City Vista;
Phil Condit, CEO of The Boeing Company;
Marian Wright Edelman, President, Children’s Defense Fund;
John Engler, Former Governor of Michigan;
Jim Hunt, Former Governor of North Carolina;
Richard D. Parsons, CEO, AOL Time Warner;
Paul Patton, Governor of Kentucky;
Hugh Price, Former President of the National Urban League;
Richard Riley, Former US Secretary of Education;
Judith Rodin, President, The University of Pennsylvania;
Andrew L. Stern, President of the Service Employees International Union; and
Jack Welch, Former CEO of General Electric.
