On May 22, 2012, the Department of Education announced a new Race to the Top - District grant competition, which will be the first ever Race to the Top competition for districts. The Department began soliciting qualified individuals to serve as peer reviewers in early July and set an application deadline of July 18. We received applications from more than 200 individuals interested in serving as peer reviewers by the initial deadline. Due to the uncertain number of grant applications, however, the Department is continuing to accept peer reviewer applications.

If you are interested in being considered to serve as a peer reviewer for the Race to the Top - District program, please submit your resume/curriculum vitae to racetothetopreview@ed.gov and complete the questionnaire at http://www.mikousa.com/surveys/index.php?sid=68846&lang=en

Reviewer Qualifications

In order to ensure a successful competition, we are seeking qualified individuals with expertise in some or all of the following areas to serve as peer reviewers:

• Four (4) core educational assurances (college- and career-ready standards and
  assessments, data systems and data use, great teachers and leaders, and school turnaround);
• Personalized learning environments;
• District reform and school level operations;
• Serving rural students or in rural areas;
• Application review and evaluation; and
• Serving high-needs students.

Availability

We anticipate that reviewers will need to commit to the following review process:

• First, reviewers will need to be available October 22-23 for a training session in Washington, DC;
• Then, reviewers will be expected to read, score, and provide comments on
  no more than five Race to the Top District applications during an off-site individual review (October 30-November 14);
• Additionally, all reviewers must be available Monday, November 19 and Tuesday,
  November 20 for possible calls to discuss applications; and
• Finally, reviewers will participate in a 3-5-day panel review in Washington, DC November 27-December 1, 2012.

Further Information

As with other Federal grant competitions, reviewers will receive compensation for their time and effort, contingent upon satisfactory completion of the review requirements and consistent with the required schedule. Travel costs to the events in Washington, DC will also be covered.

IF INTERESTED

If you are interested in being considered to serve as a peer reviewer for the Race to the Top District program, please submit your resume/curriculum vitae to racetothetopreview@ed.gov and complete the questionnaire at http://www.mikousa.com/surveys/index.php?sid=68846&lang=en no later than 11:59 pm (ET) on September 4, 2012.

To be considered for selection, potential peer reviewers must submit their resume/curriculum vitae and complete the questionnaire to ensure that the relevant information is appropriately included for consideration by the Race to the Top District team. We will vet reviewers for relevant conflict(s) of interest.

Please note, at the end of the review process, the names and short bios of peer reviewers will be posted on the Race to the Top District website in the aggregate. We will not associate the names of peer reviewers with the applications they reviewed.

Program Information

For more information about the Race to the Top District competition, go to http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop-district/index.html. Please direct all questions to the Race to the Top Peer Review inbox at racetothetopreview@ed.gov.