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President Obama on Monday opened up taxpayers checkbook for education and continued a hallmark of his presidency working around Congress to dole out billions of dollars in grants to individual states and districts, as long as they enact the kinds of changes the administration wants to see.

But some analysts say the White Houses penchant to throw money out there and hope it sticks on something useful often doesnt work, and there are signs that some of the money hasnt fully achieved its purpose.

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The administrations latest effort, the $107 million Youth CareerConnect program, is designed to deliver real-world learning opportunities for students and offer specific training in a given field before a student graduates high school.

Mr. Obama touted the initiative at Bladensburg High School in suburban Maryland on Monday morning. The school received $7 million to, among other things, craft new biomedical programs that will let students earn college credits from the University of Maryland.

We asked high schools to develop partnerships with colleges and employers and create classes that focus on real-life applications for the fields of the future, fields like science and technology and engineering and math, the president said. Part of the reason weve got to do this now is because other countries theyve got a little bit of a lead on us in some of these areas.

The CareerConnect program follows Race to the Top, a massive increase in the size of School Improvement Grants and other examples of the administrations strategy of using money and competition as a way to drive change in the classroom.

Thus far, some specialists say, the approach hasnt been an abject failure, but hasnt been a resounding success, either.

I think they have a mixed record, frankly. Race to the Top was a little different because instead of giving everybody a little bit of money, they insisted that individual states tell them what they would do with the money, said Eric Hanushek, a senior fellow at Stanford Universitys Hoover Institution who specializes in the economic analysis of educational issues.

There are other examples where they throw money out there and hope it sticks on something useful, and that almost never works, he continued.

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Obama touts $107M high school career connection program