On June 18, 2010, The US Department of Education posted on its website a summary of all Investing in Innovation (i3) applications received by the May 12, 2010 deadline. Davie County Schools was one of only four North Carolina school systems to apply for a developmental grant for Absolute Priority 1: Teacher and Principal Effectiveness. Of the 1698 i3 applications submitted nationwide, 357 were for developmental grants in the area of teacher and principal effectiveness. Others NC schools systems to apply for the same type and priority as Davie County are Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Guilford County, and Iredell-Statesville. According to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, the announcements of grant recipients will be made in late July, 2010.

The Investing in Innovation (i3) Fund was established under section 14007 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) to provide funding to support (1) local educational agencies (LEAs), and (2) nonprofit organizations in partnership with (a) one or more LEAs or (b) a consortium of schools. The purpose of the program is to provide competitive grants to applicants with a record of improving student achievement and attainment in order to expand the implementation of, and investment in, innovative practices that are demonstrated to have an impact on improving student achievement or student growth, closing achievement gaps, decreasing dropout rates, increasing high school graduation rates, or increasing college enrollment and completion rates.

In order to receive i3 funds, each applicant must secure a 20% match from a private sector entity for the total grant package. Davie County Schools requested $3,751,200 from i3 funds and received a 20% matching pledge of $937,000 from the Mebane Charitable Foundation for a total grant proposal of $4,688,200.

Davie County Schools’ i3 grant application addresses Innovations that Support Effective Teachers and Principals. Titled STEM Cell Infusion (SCI), the design is to develop and implement dynamic solutions to the systemic challenges of providing high quality 21st Century STEM professional development for existing and beginning classroom teachers through technology integration. Our model forms three small professional learning communities, STEM Cells, populated with master, student and first year teachers who will, with the support of an additional Resource Cell, intervene with 130 teachers to model delivery of STEM curricula and instruction and provide individual teacher professional development.

SCIis designed to identify, recruit, develop, place, reward, and retain teachers through the development of high quality professional development inclusive of on-the-job training, coaching and mentoring. Our proposed outcomes are to increase the number of effective teachers to improve student achievement, especially that of high need students. The project aims to serve 4,800 Kindergarten-14 (Early College) students.

Stem Cells are independent professional learning communities which are not assigned to specific classrooms, but who embed themselves into the classrooms and professional learning communities in all of our schools. Duke University’s Center for Child and Family Policy will use quantitative data obtained from standardized state academic achievement assessments, conducted on an annual basis, as the primary data source. The evaluation will have three distinct components including: a process evaluation documenting the implementation process, a practice evaluation measuring changes in teacher practice, and an outcomes evaluation measuring student achievement and growth. Our intention, based on the findings generated from this project, is to bring the STEM Cell Infusion design to scale for implementation at state and/or national levels.

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