Despite what the Tacoma News Tribune reported last week (and we linked in Monday's Fizz), there's now some good news for Gov. Chris Gregoire, who's trying to score $250 million in President Obama's Race to the Top education funding. About 239 of the state's 295 school districts (over 90 percent) have signed on to the application . (Last week's TNT report had just 111 districts, or 34 percent signing on.)

Washington state's application for the grant doesn't quite meet the Obama checklist on things like charter schools and uniform teacher evaluations, so Gregoire set out to make up for it by distinguishing Washington's application from other state's bids (which may look good on paper) by getting local school district buy-in around the state.

"What will make our application stand out from other applications nationwide is the local support," Gregoire spokesman Viet Shelton says. It's a good point: Other states can claim they're going to have uniform teacher evaluations based on student achievement (as Obama wants), but if local districts and their unions don't really buy-in, then the plan is flawed.

Gregoire is banking on the fact that Washington's application—which checks off some of Obama's other prerequisites like alternative paths to teacher certification, the ability for the state to step in and oversee the rehabilitation of failing local schools, and stronger accountability for lousy principals—will score points for being more realistic. Gregoire's plan also contains a watered down version of teacher evaluations which, while not standardized and explicitly tied to student performance (as the feds want), does at least introduce teacher evaluation as a concept.

The Seattle school district reportedly signed off last night after the union—the fourth signatory on Gregoire's list which also includes a local principal, the board, and the local superintendent—gave it the nod. The union okay was predicated on the notion that they'd have to agree to the teacher evaluation piece.

The governor's office isn't officially counting Seattle yet "until that fax comes through with their signature on it," Shelton says. He added: "It [getting districts to sign on] was a gamble, and it's erring on the side of paying off."