NEWS
- Becoming a Money Magnet: Lessons of the D.C. Ed Philanthropy Boom
- New Planned Parenthood clinic moving in next to charter school, creating concerns [Two Rivers PCS mentioned]
Becoming a Money Magnet: Lessons of the D.C. Ed Philanthropy Boom
Inside Philanthropy
By L.S. Hall
September 8, 2015
Reform-oriented approaches to K-12 education, such as charter schools and alternatives to the traditional teacher pipeline, are the key to attracting large gifts from funders, according to an analysis of education philanthropy by Michigan State University researchers.
Is that a surprising finding? Not at all, but it's super-helpful to see concrete numbers that document just how much reform funders dominate ed philanthropy.
The experience of Washington, D.C., is especially instructive for urban areas that are wondering what might bring funder support to their communities. The nation's capital became a money magnet for philanthropy in 2007, after then-Mayor Adrian Fenty appointed Michelle Rhee chancellor of the D.C. Public Schools. Rhee drew national acclaim from supporters — and harsh criticism from opponents — for her reforms to the city's school system, which included a new teacher evaluation system that could mean big bonuses for top teachers and the risk of termination for ineffective ones. The costs associated with the new system were funded by a three-year grant worth nearly $65 million from a group of foundations, including the Walton Family Foundation and the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation.
The Michigan State analysis examined K-12 education giving in 2000, 2005, and 2010 by the 15 largest funders. That year, D.C. brought in more than $31 million from national funders, far more than any other urban area in the country. The millions in philanthropy dollars amount to $705 per student in D.C. Only five years earlier, funder dollars in the nation's capital amounted to less than $100 per student. More than two-thirds of the funds went to the D.C. Public Education Fund, an organization created in 2007 to support reforms in the public school system. Another $7 million went to charter schools and pro-charter organizations, such as the New Schools Venture Fund.
Second place among urban areas went to Newark, N.J., largely on the strength of the millions given to the school system by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg that stands as a textbook example of ed philanthropy gone wrong. Meanwhile, urban areas such as Denver, Detroit, New Orleans, Los Angeles, and Chicago, received far less. Even Milwaukee, once a favorite site among reform-minded funders for its voucher program, received less than $100 per student in foundation dollars.
The analysis by Michigan State found reform-oriented policies to be a key factor in attracting support from funders such as Walton, Gates and Broad. Cities that have a Teach For America chapter or support the growth of charter schools were more likely to receive funder support. One of the report's co-authors, political scientist Sarah Reckhow, stated that funders are considering national policy priorities when deciding on local areas to support. Many of these foundations are interested in policies that challenge the K-12 status quo, such as growing charter schools and teacher evaluation systems that emphasize student achievement, as measured by test scores, over traditional factors such as seniority.
The Michigan State study is yet not published, but its findings were reported in the Washington Post.
The study does raise some cautionary notes. What happens, for example, when a reformer enacts sweeping and expensive changes, only to leave the system? Again, the D.C. case is instructive. Rhee resigned as chancellor of the D.C. Public Schools in 2010, after Mayor Fenty was defeated for a reelection, a vote seen by many political observers as a referendum on Rhee's tenure.
D.C. school officials reported a drop in funder dollars after 2010. The D.C. Education Fund raised only $5.7 million in 2014, down from $17 million in 2012 and $24 million in 2010. There are, however, signs that the decline is turning around. The fund has reportedly raised $11 million so far in 2015, according to the Washington Post. Current D.C. Chancellor Kaya Henderson may not command media attention as Rhee was able to do, but she has pro-reform credentials of her own, as a former TFA executive director. Henderson was head of the D.C. schools' Human Capital department under Rhee, and was a chief negotiator of the 2010 contract that put the teacher evaluation system in place.
Henderson also has ambitious fundraising goals. She hopes to attract $20 million in private funding for her Empowering Males of Color initiative, a series of programs aimed at greater supports for African-American and Hispanic male students. Plans include a college preparatory high school for boys slated to open in 2016. This is an area of keen funder interest, as we've reported.
Market-oriented reforms such as charter schools and new approaches to teacher evaluation continue to be magnets for funder dollars. Quite apart from the merits of these reforms, though, an important consideration is a school system's ability to sustain such changes in low funding cycles or after the loss of the reforms' champion.
By the way, we wrote last year about another study out of Michigan State by Sarah Reckhow and Jeffrey Snyder, which offered a big-picture look at philanthropic funding trends in recent years.
New Planned Parenthood clinic moving in next to charter school, creating concerns [Two Rivers PCS mentioned]
The Washington Post
By Michael Alison Chandler
September 9, 2015
Families at one of the city’s most sought-after charter schools are grappling with how to coexist with a new next-door neighbor — Planned Parenthood.
Children returned to Two Rivers Public Charter School in Northeast this school year to find sidewalks torn up and major construction underway. An abandoned warehouse is being turned into Planned Parenthood’s new flagship health center, which will provide preventive care and abortions.
The center is not scheduled to open until next spring, but protesters already have begun gathering outside, at least once waving signs at families who came in for parent-teacher meetings at Two Rivers the week before school started.
Many parents worry that they now will have to explain graphic images of aborted fetuses and the ideological underpinnings of one of the country’s most contentious debates to their young children. The clinic in the 1200 block of Fourth St., NE will be next door to an elementary school campus and across the street from a middle school campus.
“Does anyone really believe placing a Planned Parenthood facility literally between two schools is a wise decision for the safety of our children?” said Jonathan Owen, a Two Rivers parent. “Protests at abortion facilities are very heated, personal, and can turn physically violent.”
He said the clinic’s placement is an “in your face” affront to many of the families with children attending the school, particularly those with religious beliefs that don’t condone abortion.
Jessica Wodatch, the school’s executive director, and other school administrators, sent a letter to parents on Aug. 27 describing a scene that unfolded that morning involving “several protesters with graphic images” who stood in front of the middle school and the elementary school campuses outside the construction zone. The protesters waved signs at passing cars and shouted at people entering the building.
She urged families not to engage the protesters and said school officials are working with police and have plans to increase security outside the school.
“We are frustrated that we cannot protect you and your children from images and language that you may not deem appropriate for them,” Wodatch wrote. “What we can offer is that we will be relentless in doing all that we can to address this problem.”
Wodatch declined to comment for this story.
The school plans to refer children’s questions about the subject of any protests back to their families, the letter said. But Wodatch said school officials will offer age-appropriate messages about the protests themselves, such as:
“Some people don’t like the organization that is moving in next door and want to share their feelings through protesting. Sometimes that protesting may bother us because they are yelling or showing confusing or upsetting pictures. ... Those messages are meant for grown-ups, and not for you.”
Public charter schools struggle to find adequate facilities in the District. Two Rivers’s elementary campus is located in a former auto warehouse with a cramped playground on a busy corner near Union Market.
Its industrial backdrop has not discouraged parents from applying. Two Rivers, which has an “expeditionary learning” model, had the longest waitlist of any D.C. charter this year, with 1,381 children waiting for a spot in pre-school through eighth grade. The school celebrated the opening of a third campus in Ward 5 in August.
Laura Meyers, president and chief executive of Planned Parenthood of Greater Washington, said that finding space for a new clinic took two years. The organization chose the Northeast location because of its proximity to Metro — it is near the NOMA Gallaudet station — and its affordability and space for on-site parking.
Meyers said there are other Planned Parenthood clinics in the U.S. that are located near schools and that they “enjoy strong partnerships.” She said that Planned Parenthood educators work in many middle schools and high schools providing lessons on reproductive health.
Since the organization bought the 26,400-square-foot building in 2013, officials have worked with the local Advisory Neighborhood Commission and school leaders as plans were developed, Meyers said. Planned Parenthood had a meeting at the school last spring to discuss the new clinic with parents; the organization’s clinics often are the target of public anti-abortion protests, which have been known at times to become confrontational.
“I am a parent myself,” Meyers said. “I am tremendously sympathetic to parents not wanting anyone to be screaming at children about anything.”
The new location will replace its headquarters on 16th street, just blocks from the White House, where Planned Parenthood has operated a clinic for more than 40 years.
Tony Goodman, a parent at Two Rivers and also an Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner, said the school and clinic are working to mitigate potential harm from future unrest. For example, he said, the Jan. 22 anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court ruling that made abortion a legal right, is scheduled to be a teacher work day.
Alden Nouga, a Two Rivers mother of a kindergartner who works in public health, said she plans to use the new clinic as a teaching opportunity for her children about free speech and sexuality. She said conversations about sex and women’s health often get delayed or avoided.
“It has been surprising how young children are when these topics come up,” Nouga said. “We should not shy away from it.”
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