Designing Inter-Organizational Networks to Implement Education Reform: An Analysis of State Race to the Top Applications

This study sought to understand the opportunities and challenges associated with the implementation of state designed Race to the Top (RttT) funded reform networks. Drawing on a conceptual framework developed from the networked governance literature, we analyzed the 12 state RttT grantees' applications. Our analysis revealed that states designed large implementation networks with potential to bring a wide range of resources to bear on reform efforts, particularly through participation of numerous nonsystem actors. However, coordinating large and diverse networks places state education agencies (SEAs) in a new and challenging role. The extent to which networks extend state capacity to support educational improvement or further complicate the work of SEAs remains an open question. We propose a model including a set of theoretical propositions to guide future research.