Arne Duncan promoted a national vision for school turnarounds which would involve reconstituting 1,000 failing schools each year.  This mirrors the rhetoric of the education stimulus spending which requires states to make assurances that they will turn around failing schools.  Since the inception of NCLB, several schools have been deemed to be failing according to NCLB standards but hardly any concrete steps have been suggested to remedy these situations.

Duncan oversaw several school closings while in Chicago but managing closings at the national level will present new challenges.  He may be familiar with the conditions that governed school turnarounds in Chicago but the federalist nature of education will complicate matters greatly.  It will be interesting to see if Duncan can forge a set of best practices for school turnarounds that could be applied nationally as these efforts advance.