(Thumbnail Image: The Star-Ledger)

BY TRACY PFEIFFER

The state of New Jersey experienced a clerical error causing the state to potentially lose out on $400 million from the federal government’s "Race to the Top" program.

It began as a one-page error in the thousand-page application New Jersey submitted. The application asked for a comparison of funding levels in 2008 and 2009, but the state provided information regarding 2010 and 2011. (ABC News)

Next, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie railed against the Obama administration’s bureaucracy, saying the simple error had been sorted out by state education commissioner Bret Schundler — or so he had been told. (Fox News)

Before long the feds released a video of a meeting between "Race to the Top" officials and New Jersey officials, including Schundler. KYW Philadelphia explains what happened:

“After the unseen questioner asks for the correct budget information, Schundler, the education commissioner, turns to an assistant. Both appear to be struggling, trying to come up with the correct data. ... And although the education commissioner promised to supply the information, federal officials say Schundler never did.”

Gov. Christie fired Schundler for the incident, but while the finger-pointing rages on, critics are saying New Jersey’s application wasn’t up to snuff to begin with. For example, states received points if their teachers unions were behind their application plans — New Jersey’s was not. The Star-Ledger explains why:

“Schundler announced an agreement with the state’s largest teachers’ union, the New Jersey Education Association, on a compromise application for the Race to the Top funds. The governor refuted him the next day, and scrapped that compromise.”

And WYNC explains just what that cost them:

“...if that hadn't happened — the points that they could have gotten on that application for having the teachers' union on board?”

“Right, that's the big point here, is that having the teachers' union on board was critical to the success of this application. The states that managed to get that common ground with their teachers' unions had a much more successful application and these minor points that they lost because of this clerical error would have been dwarfed by the double-digit points they would have gotten.”

A writer for Politico quotes a statement released by the U.S. Education Department defending the decision to dock points from the Garden State.

“Our application requirements were very clear and a state that wanted to compete had to give us the correct information by the application deadline. At some point, you have to say: Time’s up, pencils down.”

And on ABC News, a representative from the CATO Institute says messing up an application is a telling mistake.

“If you can’t fill out your application correctly, there is some indication that maybe you don’t have the apparatus in place or the competence to execute the money that you could win.”


Full audio of Gov. Christie's remarks: The Star-Ledger

Get more multi-source news anaylsis from Newsy.com