State chiefs deterred by pilot complexity, timeline.

The article reports that there are plans to withhold proposals for the Education Department's pilot program by state chiefs because of strict criteria and narrow application timeline. According to the article, this may result to few applications for 2008 and that models submitted might not be as innovative or diverse as the U.S. Education Department wants. With this, Rick Melmer, education secretary of South Dakota and Council of Chief State School Officers (CSSO) hopes that further conversations with the agency will yield additional flexibility.