Monterey County schools could be short $11 milllion next year

As part of reform efforts, some Monterey County schools applied for a federal School Improvement Grant -- SIG -- which is supposed to be used to implement major changes for school considered to be underperforming. Several schools in Monterey County, including three from MPUSD, applied and received grants to reform their schools

But the SIG grant program is under fire by the U.S. Department of Education, which reported California is out of compliance with the program. Members of the State Board of Education voted Wednesday to halt funds to all the schools in the program until they're in compliance with federal requirements. The bloggers at the Silicon Valley Education Foundation do a good job at reporting on the saga.

The Department of Education report is based on visits to three schools only -- two in Los Angeles and one in San Francisco -- so it's not clear whether they've visited Monterey County at all.

In Monterey County, the schools or districts slated to receive SIG funds were: Highland, $1.1 million; Martin Luther King, $1.1 million; Seaside High, $1.6 million; MPUSD, $1.5 million; Chualar Union, $295,000; Greenfield Union, $1.3 million; Pajaro Valley Unified, $2.2 million; Soledad Unified, $1.5 million.