The Wake County school board appointed five principals tonight while moving four principals to assistant principal posts.

Gregory Butler was named principal of North Garner Middle School with a salary of $92,707.68. He has been an assistant principal at Southeast Raleigh High since 2009.

Carmen Graf was named principal of Banks Road Elementary School in Fuquay-Varina with a salary of $73,803.68. Graf has been an assistant principal at Timber Drive Elementary since October.

UPDATE

Click here to view the bio sheets.

The Wake County school board announced tonight they had replaced three principals who are part of a new program to help struggling schools and had also chosen a new leader for Southeast Raleigh High.

New principals were chosen for Barwell Road, Brentwood and Wilburn elementary schools while the principal of Creech Road Elementary was allowed to keep her job. They’re all part of the Renaissance Schools program, a new effort targeting additional resources at Wake’s four lowest-performing elementary schools.

The principals and teachers at the four Renaissance schools had to reapply if they wanted to keep their jobs, which comes with a hiring bonus and merit pay. Those who aren’t hired back or don’t want to stay are transferred to other schools.

SEE END OF POST FOR BIO SHEETS FOR THE PRINCIPALS

Here's some more details about the Renaissance Model being used to turn around the Wake County school system's four lowest performing elementary schools.

The quick description is that additional resources, including new technology, signing bonuses and performance bonuses, will be used at Barwell Road, Brentwood, Creech Road and Wilburn elementary schools. All four schools happen to have high poverty levels but they were chosen because their passing rates were below 60 percent on state exams last year.

The issue has gotten more attention this week because the school board voted Tuesday on a $950,000 a year bonus plan for the schools using federal Race to the Top money.

Today's Wake County school board meeting will be long and touch on a variety of topics, including reassignment, bonuses to work at high-poverty schools, redistricting, bell schedules and the magnet review.

The school board will vote today on the last three potential changes to the 2011-12 student reassignment plan, including moving school board member John Tedesco's neighborhood from Creech Road Elementary to Aversboro Elementary. The plan calls for splitting off the part of the node that includes his subdivision to go to Aversboro.

Also as noted in today's article by Thomas Goldsmith, the board will vote on setting aside $950,000 in Race to the Top grant money to provide signing bonuses and merit pay to teachers who will work at the four Renaissance schools: Barwell Road, Brentwood Road, Creech Road and Wilburn elementary schools.

Next year's Wake County student reassignment plan is a work in progress with everything approved by the old school board under review with new suggestions coming in all the time.

During Tuesday's work session, Laura Evans, senior director of growth and planning, laid out to the board an explanation of the assignments being considered and the direction they're leaning toward. It will help to have your copy of the handout present.

The ensuing discussion showed how the thinking has changed to reflect the new student assignment policy. Multiple times, Evans talked about bringing students home, having them attend their neighborhood schools and moving the least number possible for stability.

Wake County's share of the Race To the Top Grant could be used to reinvent four low-performing elementary schools.

Wake is slated to get $10.2 million over the next four years. Interim Superintendent Donna Hargens told board members today that administrators want to use the grant money for efforts such as teacher performance pay and additional technology at schools where lower than 60 percent of students are passing state exams.

This group now includes Barwell Road, Brentwood and Wilburn elementary schools in Raleigh and Creech Road Elementary School in Garner.

While the official word isn't expected until later today, it's pretty evident that the Wake County school system isn't winning a $10.3 million federal magnet school grant.

As noted in today's article, school board member John Tedesco confirmed through his congressional contacts that Wake isn't among the $100 million in grant recipients. It's what I'm hearing too.

What it means depends on your point of view.

UPDATE

It's official. Wake didn't win. Click here for the press release from the U.S. Department of Education.  To make it equivalent, it's $100 million this year but potentially up to $300 million over three years. Wake wanted $4 million in the first year for a total of $10.3 million over three years.

Now for some good news today for the Wake County school system.

The U.S. Education Department has announced that Wake has won a $1.8 million federal grant that will allow the district to continue a teacher merit pay program at Wilburn Elementary School.  Wilburn is the only Wake school that uses merit pay in which some teachers could get bonuses while others get none based on how their students and the school perform.

Wilburn has used the TAP program since 2008. Under TAP, Wilburn teachers have received bonuses of $2,000 a year based on student performance on state tests. In addition, the school provides money to pay newly created master teacher and mentor teacher positions as a way to keep educators in the classroom.

The elimination of socioeconomic diversity in filling Wake County's magnet schools and year-round schools had immediate results this year.

As noted in today's article, the acceptance rates shot up for both magnet schools and year-round schools. You had 812 more people accepted into magnet schools as hundreds of seats that had previously been left vacant for diversity reasons were filled.

(There's a long list of links at the bottom of the post for numbers crunchers.)

CORRECTED BAD LINKS FOR THIS YEAR'S SCHOOL-BY-SCHOOL TOTALS

The TAP program could get a big boost now that the new school board majority is set to take over on Tuesday.

As noted in today's article, the new majority thinks TAP can help provide incentives for teachers to work at high-poverty schools, which would increase in some areas under neighborhood schools.

It's a shift from how TAP was viewed by the old board as a supplement to the diversity policy. Outgoing board members such as Patti Head had thought of using TAP in schools where the F&R percentages were high despite efforts to balance enrollment.