School Division Applications
Virginia received $59.8 million through the federal School Improvement Grants (SIG) program (1003g) to raise student achievement in the commonwealth’s persistently lowest achieving schools. These funds are part of the $3.5 billion in school-improvement funding made available to states in the 2009 federal budget and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
School divisions receiving SIG funds for "Tier I" and "Tier II" schools must implement one of the following four reform models in their persistently lowest achieving schools:
- Turnaround Model: Replace the principal, screen existing school staff and rehire no more than half the teachers; adopt a new governance structure; and improve the school through curriculum reform, professional development, extending learning time and other strategies.
- Restart Model: Convert a school or close it and re-open it as a charter school or under an education management organization.
- School Closure: Close the school and send the students to higher-achieving schools in the district.
- Transformation Model: Replace the principal and improve the school through comprehensive curriculum reform, professional development, extending learning time, and other strategies.
Schools in Tier III must implement the Virginia state transformation model, which includes the assignment of a school-improvement coach. More about School Improvement Tiers, below.
VDOE approved funding for 59 schools in 33 school divisions
Select a locality for school division information below. All documents in the table below are PDF files unless otherwise indicated.
| School Division Applications | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Counties | Cities & Towns | ||
| Amherst | Fluvanna | Orange | Alexandria |
| Arlington | Grayson | Pittsylvania | Colonial Beach |
| Brunswick | Henrico | Prince Edward | Danville |
| Charles City | King George | Pulaski | Franklin |
| Craig | King and Queen | Shenandoah | Newport News |
| Culpeper | Lancaster | Sussex | Norfolk |
| Essex | Northampton | Westmoreland | Petersburg |
| Fairfax | Portsmouth | ||
| Richmond | |||
| Roanoke | |||
| Suffolk | |||
School Improvement Tiers
- Tier I — A Title I school in improvement, corrective action, or restructuring that is among the lowest-achieving five percent of Title I schools in improvement, corrective action, or restructuring based on the academic achievement of the “all students” group in reading/language arts and mathematics combined and the school has not reduced its failure rate in reading/language arts and/or mathematics by 10 to 15 percent each year for the past two years.
- Tier II — A secondary school that is eligible for, but does not receive, Title I funds that is among the lowest-achieving five percent of schools based on the academic achievement of the “all students” group in reading/language arts and mathematics combined and the school has not reduced its failure rate in reading/language arts and/or mathematics by 10 to 15 percent each year for the past two years (Tier II); or a high school that has had a graduation rate of less than 60 percent for two years.
- Tier III — A Title I school in improvement, corrective action, or restructuring that is in Years 2-7 of Title I School Improvement that is not in Tier I; or a Title I eligible school that is not in Tier I or Tier II and is in the bottom 20 percent of all schools in the state based on proficiency rates.
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