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Thursday, December 9, 2010

Report: Many officials willing to replace half of staff to turn around schools

Report: Many officials willing to replace half of staff to turn around schools

Report: Many officials willing to replace half of staff to turn around schools

Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 9, 2010; 5:23 PM

Education officials across the country have replaced the principals and at least half of the staff in about 150 struggling schools to obtain federal aid, the Obama administration disclosed Thursday.

In several hundred other cases, principals have been replaced and other major steps taken as part of the administration's unprecedented $3.5 billion campaign to rejuvenate thousands of the nation's lowest-performing schools.

The initiative, which reflects President Obama's get-tough policy on school reform, is likely to be central to the coming debate in Congress over revision of the No Child Left Behind law.

Thursday's report on the school improvement grant program shows that despite protests this year over proposals to fire large numbers of