This presentation focuses on the quasi-experimental methods used to select comparison schools for an evaluation of a federal investing in innovation (i3) validation grant. The Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium (NETCO) consists of 29 high schools participating in a five-year program to expand students' access to rigorous courses. The research question for this presentation is: How can propensity score matching be used to identify comparison schools for the evaluation of the NETCO intervention? This report describes the propensity score model used to select comparison schools, the techniques used to refine the model, and the recruitment of the comparison schools. Twenty-nine high schools in fifteen school districts from Northeast Tennessee were selected to participate in the intervention prior to the award of the grant. Overall, the preliminary propensity score analysis for the NETCO evaluation is able to substantially reduce differences in observable characteristics between the i3 schools and non-i3 schools in the state. There are no statistically significant differences in t-tests of the covariates between the treatment group and the matched comparison group, and the absolute standardized bias is less than 0.5 for all covariates. (Contains 1 table, 3 figures and 2 footnotes.)