Kudos to the United Teachers of Los Angeles who refused to give in to pressure from LA’s public schools.  The district attempted to use the the Race to the Top application to strong arm the UTLA into accepting a new teacher evaluation system based on high stakes standardized testing scores.

As a result the Los Angeles Unified School District lost out on $40 million in federal funding.  Of course we know from experience that RTTT money actually  isn’t used for anything useful in school districts.  It seems the UTLA’s president Warren Fletcher knows that too.  “Race to the Top costs more than it brings in,” Fletcher said. “You’re essentially setting up a system with a lot of bureaucracy, and those pieces have to stay in place after the grant period.”