Nonprofit News and Comment

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Oregon charter school founders accused in $20 million racketeering lawsuit.” By Betsy Hammond. Oregonian. January 4, 2013. Tim King and Norm Donohoe, who ran a chain of taxpayer-funded charter schools across small-town Oregon from their headquarters in Clackamas, scammed the state out of $17 million and must repay that plus $2.7 million more, the state said in a court filing this week. The legal claim, brought Thursday by the Oregon Department of Justice in Marion County Circuit Court, accuses the pair of racketeering, money laundering and other fraud from 2007 to 2010. King and Donohoe, who were the director and president, respectively, of a nonprofit they named EdChoices, submitted false, incomplete and misleading records about how many students were enrolled in the schools and how they were spending the state’s money, state prosecutors say in the complaint. “It’s not true,” Donohoe said when reached after 5 p.m. Friday. He said EdChoices’ attorney would need to speak for him but was not available after hours. King could not be reached for comment. The pair opened and operated at least 10 charter schools that went by various and changing names, including Baker Web Academy, Estacada Early College and Sheridan AllPrep Academy. Most were launched under the name AllPrep. They existed under agreements with the school boards in Estacada, Sisters, Baker City, Sheridan, Burns and Marcola, but enrolled students from across the state in their online programs. The state provided startup grants of up to $450,000 per charter school. The state Department of Educational so paid about $6,000 a year for each student enrolled, relying on the charter school operators to document the number. The state now says those records were “erroneous, false and misleading.” King was the charismatic front man for AllPrep when the schools’ unraveling finances prompted state regulators in the education and justice departments to begin asking questions in spring 2010. He quickly stepped down. Donohoe said Friday that he doesn’t know how to reach him.

“D.C. charter schools expel students at far higher rates than traditional public schools.” By Emma Brown. Washington Post. January 5, 2013. The District’s public charter schools have expelled students at a far higher rate than the city’s traditional public schools in recent years, according to school data, highlighting a key difference between two sectors that compete for the District’s students and taxpayer dollars. D.C. charter schools expelled 676 students in the past three years, while the city’s traditional public schools expelled 24, according to a Washington Post review of school data. During the 2011-12 school year, when charters enrolled 41 percent of the city’s students, they removed 227 children for discipline violations and had an expulsion rate of 72 per 10,000 students; the District school system removed three and had an expulsion rate of less than 1 per 10,000 students. The discrepancy underscores the freedom that charters — publicly funded schools that operate independently of the traditional school system — have from school system policies. That autonomy defines the charter movement and gives its schools considerable latitude to decide what student behavior they will — and won’t — tolerate.

HIGHER EDUCATION

“Pressure to Rein In Tuition Squeezes Colleges.” By Michael Corkery. Wall Street Journal/Associated Press. December 30, 2012. Private colleges are facing pressure to slow tuition hikes and boost aid, as families question the cost. College officials say the long-held faith among many Americans that college is worth whatever it costs is starting to waver under the weight of lackluster job prospects, stagnant wages and a pileup of student debt. The shift is already threatening to put stress on some schools’ finances. Average tuition this past year rose by the smallest percentage in at least 40 years among the 960 private schools that belong to the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, which collectively enroll 90% of the students in private colleges. It climbed 3.9% to $29,305. Twenty-four of the group’s colleges froze tuition during the 2012-13 academic year, more than double the previous year’s total. Eight colleges shrank tuition costs, up from six in the 2011-12 academic year and none in the previous academic year. Colleges freezing tuition this year include Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass., while Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J., cut tuition for high-achieving applicants. “They are treating us like they are buying a pair of shoes,” says Donald Farish, president of Roger Williams University, a 3,785-student college in Bristol, R.I. More students are attracted to the college “that gets me the best value,” he says. Roger Williams said in October that it will freeze tuition for the 2013-14 academic year at the current $29,976 and vowed not to increase tuition for its next freshman class for four years. Mr. Farish says that the school froze tuition because “costs are increasing faster than people’s incomes and we need to keep it affordable.”

“Harvard Braces for Decline in Federal Funding; Harvard Braces for Decline in Federal Funding.” By Nicholas P. Fandos and Samuel Y. Weinstock. Harvard Crimson. December 30, 2012. As Washington lawmakers scramble to reach a last-minute budget deal before the end of the year, Harvard and other research universities are bracing for what would be the most dramatic cut in federal research funding in recent history. Failure to come up with a compromise to avert the so-called fiscal cliff by midnight Monday will trigger an 8.2 percent across-the-board cut in non-defense discretionary spending. As a result, Harvard will lose out on millions of dollars in promised federal grant money for the 2013 fiscal year. Because the cuts will be applied to the current fiscal year, which began July 1, the loss in sponsorship will be compounded onto the second half of the fiscal year, worsening the blow for the remainder of the 2013 fiscal calendar. The University received roughly $656 million in federal sponsorship during the 2012 fiscal year. Though the University has yet to release information for the 2013 fiscal year, sponsorship figures were not expected to change drastically from current levels. Federal sponsorship comprised about 16 percent of the University’s overall operating budget for the fiscal year 2012, according to the Office for Sponsored Programs 2012 annual report. The schools most at risk from federal cuts are Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health, both of which rely heavily on the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation for funding. The Medical School alone took in over $250 million in federal funds during the 2012 fiscal year, a sum that accounted for 34 percent of its operating budget. Though the School of Public Health brought in a slightly smaller total of nearly $193 million, that amount was 55 percent of the school’s overall budget. Of all University schools receiving significant federal support, The Faculty of Arts and Sciences is the most diversified, relying heavily on private sponsorship in addition to federal support. FAS received just over $135 million in federal monies for the fiscal year 2012—about 12 percent of its overall budget.

EDUCATION

HIGHER EDUCATION

“N.Y.U. and Other Medical Schools Offer Shorter Course in Training, for Less Tuition.” By Anemona Hartocollis. New York Times. December 23, 2012. Training to become a doctor takes so long that just the time invested has become, to many, emblematic of the gravity and prestige of the profession. But now one of the nation’s premier medical schools, New York University, and a few others around the United States are challenging that equation by offering a small percentage of students the chance to finish early, in three years instead of the traditional four. Administrators at N.Y.U. say they can make the change without compromising quality, by eliminating redundancies in their science curriculum, getting students into clinical training more quickly and adding some extra class time in the summer. Not only, they say, will those doctors be able to hang out their shingles to practice earlier, but they will save a quarter of the cost of medical school — $49,560 a year in tuition and fees at N.Y.U., and even more when room, board, books, supplies and other expenses are added in. “We’re confident that our three-year students are going to get the same depth and core knowledge, that we’re not going to turn it into a trade school,” said Dr. Steven Abramson, vice dean for education, faculty and academic affairs at N.Y.U. School of Medicine. At this point, the effort involves a small number of students at three medical schools: about 16 incoming students at N.Y.U., or about 10 percent of next year’s entering class; 9 at Texas Tech Health Science Center School of Medicine; and even fewer, for now, at Mercer University School of Medicine’s campus in Savannah, Ga. A similar trial at Louisiana State University has been delayed because of budget constraints.

“More private colleges holding line on tuition.” By Nick Anderson. Washington Post. December 27, 2012. Savvy families shopping for college know that tuition typically rises faster than inflation. So Lauren Seely and her parents in Northwest Washington were startled to learn this year that an upper-tier private college on her short list had frozen its price. Tuition and fees at Mount Holyoke — $41,456 in fall 2011 — would not rise one dollar in 2012. That helped clinch Seely’s decision last spring to enroll at the Massachusetts women’s college. The freeze reflects a growing movement to hold the line on price in higher education’s private sector, a strategy often targeting those who qualify for little or no financial aid but who worry about how to pay for college in uncertain economic times. For many families, aware that sticker prices for private schools can be at least three times higher than for public ones, these concerns are intensifying as application deadlines approach early next month. At least 24 private schools froze tuition this year and eight cut it, according to the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, which said both totals were unprecedented. Other colleges advertise minimal price hikes. These can be risky moves for nonprofit institutions with high fixed expenses. Hiring a skilled faculty and keeping average class size small — two chief selling points for private colleges — is not cheap. Capping tuition or slowing its growth is especially challenging for schools without major endowments.

TECHNOLOGY

“The Hidden Revolution in Online Learning; The economics of digital learning will undermine the liberal biases built into the current education system.” By Lewis M. Andrews. Wall Street Journal. December 26, 2012. More and more is written these days about the potential of Internet-based courses and supporting electronic technology to better educate American students. Among the tantalizing predictions: Instruction will be highly individualized, social promotion will be eliminated, and an Ivy League education will be available for pennies to anyone who wants one. Remarkably absent from these scenarios is any discussion of the ideological implications of electronic instruction. Yet the political agenda of educators—including the subtle (and not so subtle) ways that agenda shades everything from the political endorsements of teachers unions to the actual teaching of subject matter—has always been influenced by the organizational structure in which educators operate. It is no coincidence that America’s K-12 and university systems, both of which bestow the security of lifetime employment (tenure) to those who master the relevant obstacle course, currently produce teachers who are disproportionately liberal. Nor is it a coincidence that political correctness is at its worst in the very learning communities supposedly dedicated to open-mindedness. Conservative criticism of a society managed by credentialed elites understandably stirs their intense hostility: The conservative opposition threatens the legitimacy of academic systems based on professional privilege. The technological transformation of education has wide-ranging political implications. Blended learning may not eliminate the need for classroom instructors, but it will reduce the numbers required. Over time, the reduction will significantly reduce the amount of dues raised by teachers unions—and therefore the influence of one of the most liberal constituencies within the Democrat Party. It will also reduce the manpower available at election time to canvass neighborhoods, cover phone banks and drive people to the voting booth in support of left-leaning candidate

PRIVATE & PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS

“When New England Progressives Won’t Tolerate Evangelicals; Once a center of 19th-century evangelism, Northfield, Mass., is unsettled by the prospect of a school with religious aims.” By Mollie Ziegler Hemingway. Wall Street Journal. December 28, 2012. The small town of Northfield, Mass., was at the center of evangelical revivalism in the late 19th century. In 1879, the celebrated evangelist and publisher Dwight L. Moody returned to his birthplace to establish the Northfield Seminary for Girls. Thousands of visitors flocked to Moody’s summer seminars to hear prominent preachers from around the world. A grand hotel was even built to accommodate them. These days the school sits empty. There are no throngs of visitors to the sleepy town. Shopkeepers say they’re struggling to stay in business, and there are no more gas stations. Even so, the billionaire Oklahoma family that is trying to revive the town’s evangelical presence is running into opposition. Moody died in 1899. In later decades, the Northfield Seminary’s evangelistic zeal grew cold, even as it became one of the Northeast’s elite prep schools. In 1971, the seminary merged with its nearby brother school, Mount Hermon. Famous alumni of Northfield Mount Hermon now include White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, actress Uma Thurman and the late literature professor and pro-Palestinian activist Edward Said. “Throughout the 20th century, a new Christian view stressing social justice and good works in place of personal salvation grew not only in the world, but also on the board of trustees,” the school’s website says, explaining why it abandoned the original vision of “creating generations of committed Christians who would continue [Moody's] evangelical efforts.” Unable to maintain its 217-acre campus and 43 buildings, the board of Northfield Mount Hermon tried to sell the campus for $20 million in 2005. With no takers and prohibitive annual upkeep costs, the school sold the property to the Green family of Oklahoma City, owners of the Hobby Lobby craft stores, for $100,000. The Greens planned to give the property to the C.S. Lewis Foundation to launch a college with a Great Books curriculum. But the foundation’s fundraising fell short by the end of 2011 and the Greens began soliciting new proposals. The family does insist that whoever ultimately takes over the school promote Christianity in “the tradition of Moody.” That has people in Northfield worried about how well the new neighbors will fit in culturally.

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Gloucester charter school to close doors at year’s end.” By James Vaznis. Boston Globe. December 19, 2012. The troubled Gloucester Community Arts Charter School will voluntarily shut down in June, under a last-minute deal -approved by a state board Tuesday that should bring to an end one of the most divisive and politically charged charter school openings in the state’s history. The charter school’s willingness to surrender its state operating ¬license, after four years of fighting for survival, came as a surprise to many attendees at a meeting of the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, where many were expecting to see another ¬intense showdown on whether the school should remain open. Most recently, the charter school has suffered from low test scores, poor finances, and underenrollment, and its opening in 2010 had long been opposed by many city leaders and parents in Gloucester. “Gloucester now enters a new era in its education life,” state Senator Bruce Tarr, a Gloucester -Republican who has long criticized the state for allowing the charter school to open, said in testimony to the board.

FOR-PROFIT EDUCATION

“The Irrational Fear of For-Profit Education; Government is biased against commercial school operators, despite often better results.” By Frederick M. Hess. Wall Street Journal. December 17, 2012. McGraw-Hill recently announced plans to sell its education publishing division to Apollo Global Management for $2.5 billion. The deal is a reminder that K-12 schooling is a $600 billion-a-year business. In 2008, schools and systems spent $22 billion on transportation, $20 billion on food services and even $1 billion on pencils. These transactions typically elicit only yawns. Yet angry cries of “privatization” greet the relatively modest number of reform-minded, for-profit providers that offer tutoring or charter-school options to kids trapped in lousy schools. Gallup surveys show that more than 75% of Americans are comfortable with for-profit provision of transportation and facilities. Barely a third are fine with for-profits running schools. This bias shows up in federal legislation that bans for-profit ventures from competing in the U.S. Department of Education’s Investing in Innovation Fund. When New York legislators lifted the state’s charter-school cap in 2010, they placated unions by banning for-profit charters. Most recently, the reform-minded group Parent Revolution has pushed for legislation prohibiting parents who have invoked the “parent trigger”—through which they can vote to reconstitute a failing school—from joining with for-profit charter-school operators. This state of affairs is highly unusual, notes John Bailey, executive director of Digital Learning Now. In areas like health care, clean energy and space exploration, “policymakers do not ask whether they should engage for-profit companies, but how they should.”

“Princeton Review to Pay Millions After Forging Records.” By Al Baker. New York Times. December 20, 2012. The owner of the Princeton Review will pay the government up to $10 million after admitting it falsified attendance records to bill for thousands of hours of taxpayer-financed tutoring services it never provided, federal prosecutors said on Thursday. The Princeton Review, well known for its private test-preparation courses and guidebooks for the SAT and other tests, also provided tutoring to poor-performing New York City public school students through a federally financed program. According to the United States attorney’s office, from 2006 to 2010 Princeton Review site managers, under pressure from supervisors to meet quotas, forged students’ signatures on daily attendance sheets. Some of the attendance forms contained misspellings of students’ names, or reflected a student as present who was actually absent. The Princeton Review has no connection to Princeton University.

HIGHER EDUCATION

“An Introduction to College Giving; Four simple rules to make sure donations to your alma mater have the biggest impact.” Wall Street Journal. December 14, 2012. [For story, go to Philanthropy].

“A Changing Clubhouse, a Changing Faculty.” Harvard Crimson. December 17, 2012. [For story, go to Mutual Benefit Organizations].

PUBLIC SCHOOL PHILANTHROPY

“Astor Estate Creates Fund.” By Pia Catton. Wall Street Journal. December 20, 2012. A $42 million fund to improve the reading skills of New York City students has been created from the settlement of Brooke Astor’s estate, attorney general Eric T. Schneiderman announced on Thursday. Astor died in 2007. Her son, Anthony Marshall, was convicted in 2009 of stealing millions from his mother as she was dying. Mr. Schneiderman’s settlement ultimately allowed charities to receive $100 million. This fund comes in part from the Sotheby’s auction of her property. The New York Community Trust will administer the Brooke Astor Fund for New York City Education to “advance Mrs. Astor’s passionate commitment to educating and improving the lives of New Yorkers, especially those most in need,” said Mr. Schneiderman in a statement.

EDUCATION

HIGHER EDUCATION

“N.Y.U. Head Faces Prelude to a No-Confidence Vote.” By Ariel Kaminer. New York Times. December 12, 2012. Professors at New York University’s largest school are planning to meet Thursday to contemplate a bold undertaking: holding a no-confidence vote about the university’s president, John Sexton. Faculty members of the school, the School of Arts and Sciences, who favor holding a vote say Dr. Sexton has been unresponsive to the faculty’s concerns. In particular, they cite the university’s plan to expand in Greenwich Village, over the opposition of 38 academic departments, and its efforts to establish footholds around the world, even in countries where there is no academic freedom, where professors are then asked to work. They also say that his administration has a top-down leadership style that is at odds with the traditions of faculty governance. The meeting on Thursday is only one step: the topic at hand will be whether to hold a no-confidence vote, but that vote would not occur until later, and would involve only the quarter or so of N.Y.U.’s faculty members at the School of Arts and Science. And though no-confidence votes have contributed to the downfall of some university presidents, including Lawrence H. Summers, Harvard’s former president, they are typically nonbinding resolutions that do not obligate the university to take any particular action. Even so, this preliminary measure is an indication of the strong opinions that Dr. Sexton’s tenure has produced. “Universities are academic institutions and they’re run by academics in conjunction with administrators and the board of trustees,” said Christine Harrington, a politics professor who is the chairwoman of the faculty senators’ council’s governance committee. Under the current administration, however, she said: “Academic decisions and policy decisions which faculty used to be involved in developing, deciding and implementing have shifted dramatically and at a very fast pace out of our hands. We learn about decisions after they’ve been made. That has produced an enormous amount of cynicism, apathy and outrage.”

“$100-million gift to cover costs for 30-plus UCLA medical students David Geffen is donating the money for the scholarships, which are unprecedented, says an official with the Assn. of American Medical Colleges.” By Anna Gorman. Los Angeles Times. December 12, 2012. More than 30 incoming medical school students will get a full ride to UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine thanks to a $100-million gift from the school’s benefactor. The donation by Geffen, a philanthropist and entertainment executive, will create a scholarship fund to cover the recipients’ entire cost of medical school, including tuition, room and board, books and other expenses. The gift, which will be announced Thursday, makes Geffen the largest individual donor to UCLA and to any single UC campus. In 2002, Geffen donated $200 million in unrestricted funds to the medical school. At the time, the campus was renamed in his honor. Geffen, 69, declined to comment but said in a statement that students shouldn’t be discouraged by the expense of medical school. “The cost of a world-class medical education should not deter our future innovators, doctors and scientists from the path they hope to pursue,” he said. “We need the students at this world-class institution to be driven by determination and the desire to do their best work and not by the fear of crushing debt. I hope in doing this that others will be inspired to do the same.” More than 85% of medical school students nationwide graduate with some debt. Among those, the average is $170,000, according to the Assn. of American Medical Colleges. That debt often influences graduates’ career choices and has contributed to a shortage of primary care doctors, who often earn less than specialists. That shortage will be exacerbated by the aging of the population and the federal expansion of health coverage to the uninsured.
Related story:
“David Geffen Donates $100 Million For Scholarships To UCLA Medical School.” Huffington Post. December 14, 2012.

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Online Charter Schools Spent Millions Of Taxpayer Dollars On Advertising To Recruit New Students.” No by-line. Huffington Post. December 3, 2012. An analysis by USA Today has revealed that 10 of the largest online charter schools spent an estimated $94.4 million in taxpayer dollars on advertising over the past five years. The largest, Virginia-based K12 Inc., spent approximately $21.5 million in just the first eight months of 2012. The estimates are based on advertising rates and buys compiled by Kantar Media, a New York-based provider of “media and marketing intelligence,” according to the paper. K12 spokesman Jeff Kwitowski declined to comment to USA Today on whether the estimates are accurate, but defended the company’s marketing strategy.”We try our best to ensure that all families know that these options exist,” Kwitowski told USA Today. “It’s really about the parents’ choice — they’re the ones that make the decision about what school or program is the best fit for their child.” According to the Colorado consulting firm Evergreen Education Group, about 275,000 students nationwide attend school online full-time. While charter schools claim they need to spend money on advertising to make parents and students aware of their institutions, critics contend the public dollars the schools receive could be better spent helping current students learn, rather than recruiting new ones.

“Louisiana School Voucher Program Gets Constitutionality Hearing In Court.” No by-line. Huffington Post. December 3, 2012. A Louisiana district court judge is expected to rule this week on the constitutionality of the state’s controversial school voucher program. Baton Rouge Judge Tim Kelley began hearing arguments Wednesday on Louisiana’s landmark new initiative, the most sweeping voucher program in the country. Under the “Student Scholarships for Educational Excellence Program,” tens of millions of tax dollars will be shifted from public schools to pay private schools, businesses and private tutors to educate students across the state. In response, Louisiana teachers’ unions and 43 districts filed lawsuits to block the program. They argue the program unconstitutionally uses local tax dollars to fund private education and that state lawmakers failed to follow constitutional procedures for its filing and approval. Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal says the voucher program will spur school competition and expand parental choice and has made it the cornerstone of his bold effort to reform public education in the state. But critics are concerned about funding and fairness — vouchers would cover the full cost of tuition at more than 120 private schools, including small, Bible-based church schools. At stake are the 5,000 or so public school students who currently have their tuition funded by public tax dollars to attend private and church schools. The program is expected to cost about $25 million for the 2012-2013 academic year — 0.7 percent of the state’s overall education funding. The hearing in Baton Rouge also comes as plans for school voucher programs are gaining traction across the country. In Indiana, for example, enrollment in the state’s school choice program has more than doubled in its second year, with 9,324 families participating, up from 3,919 last year. But like Louisiana, Indiana’s initiative is being challenged in court over its constitutionality. Proponents of vouchers say such programs expand horizons for students stuck in troubled schools. Opponents argue vouchers instead erode funding for public schools by pulling money out of the system and violate the separation of church and state by sending public dollars to parochial private schools.

“Grants Back Public-Charter Cooperation.” By Motoko Rich. Wall Street Journal. December 5, 2012. In an effort to encourage collaboration between charter schools and traditional neighborhood schools, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has awarded $25 million in grants to seven cities. The Gates Foundation, which is one of the largest philanthropic players in public education, was scheduled to announce the grants on Wednesday to Boston, Denver, Hartford, New Orleans, New York, Philadelphia and Spring Branch, Tex. Relationships between traditional public schools and charters, which are publicly financed but privately operated, are often fraught, with neighborhood schools seeing charters as rivals for money and the most motivated students. Charter schools, which have been operating in the United States for two decades and now educate about two million children across the country, were originally conceived as places to experiment with new ideas in education that could be transferred to their traditional counterparts. But that transfer has not often taken place smoothly. “It took Microsoft and Apple 10 years to learn to talk,” said Don Shalvey, a deputy director at the Gates Foundation who focuses on college readiness. “So it’s not surprising that it took a little bit longer for charters and other public schools. It’s pretty clear there is more common ground than battleground.” The grants will support a variety of projects in the seven cities, which are among 16 that have signed district-charter collaboration compacts with the Gates Foundation over the last two years.

HIGHER EDUCATION

“AAUP criticizes Yale-NUS.” By Aleksandra Gjorgievska. Yale Daily News. December 5, 2012. The American Association of University Professors issued a statement Tuesday to express “a growing concern” regarding the establishment of Yale-NUS College. In the statement, the Association, which is dedicated to upholding academic freedom and promoting shared university governance at schools nationwide, urges the Yale Corporation to release all documents related to the founding of the Singaporean liberal arts college, and calls for the University to establish “appropriate and genuinely open forums” in which the academic and political dimensions of the new school can be debated. “We are concerned about the implications of the undertaking for academic freedom and the maintenance of educational standards at Yale and elsewhere,” said the statement, which was written by AAUP members Joan Bertin, Marjorie Heins, Cary Nelson and Henry Reichman. The statement poses 16 questions of the Yale-NUS initiative — a partnership between between Yale and the National University of Singapore — including whether members of the college community will be subjected to Singapore’s Internet firewalls and monitoring systems and whether speakers invited to campus will be affected by restrictions on visitors to Singapore. Yale-NUS President Pericles Lewis said the school, which will welcome its inaugural class of roughly 150 in the fall of 2013, has shown a strong commitment to academic freedom.

“Cooper Union Students Protest Threat To Free Tuition.” By Joel Rose. Morning Edition/National Public Radio. December 5, 2012. A student occupation at Cooper Union is entering its third day. The New York school of art, architecture and engineering is famous for not charging tuition to undergraduates. Administrators say the school is facing a financial crisis and needs to find new revenue sources.

PUBLIC SCHOOL PHILANTHROPY

“12 Of 16 TFA Recruits Leave City Schools.” By Melissa Bailey. New Haven Independent. December 4, 2012. Kait moved out. Kate moved in. Same apartment, same job, same mission: To reach kids at one of New Haven’s toughest schools. Will the new Kate stay? Kate Renkosiak started work this fall as a new science teacher at Wexler/Grant, a K-8 “turnaround” school in Dixwell. She landed the job through Teach For America (TFA), a leading national not-for-profit that lures talented young people into urban classrooms on a mission to narrow the racial achievement gap. Kate Renkosiak replaced Kait Shorrock, was also a TFA recruit. Shorrock was one of 16 TFA corps members to join the New Haven public school system in the fall of 2010. Of those 16, 12 left the public school district after fulfilling their two-year commitment, according to TFA’s statewide director, Nate Snow. Four stuck around at district schools. Six kept teaching at low-income schools outside of New Haven. In the fall of 2010, TFA also placed 15 recruit in Achievement First charter schools; eight of them remain in those schools, he said. Snow argued that despite TFA’s lower retention rate—which tends to fall far below New Haven’s teacher retention rate of 68 percent after two years—TFA is making strong contributions to city schools and the education field. New Haven school officials agreed: The school board last week approved a contract giving the district the OK to hire up to 26 TFA recruits next school year. The school district pays TFA $2,500 per teacher per year for two years to pay for training and coaching. In all, there are 46 TFA corps members currently in their first or second year of teaching in New Haven, including the public school district and charter schools, according to Snow.

EDUCATION

HIGHER EDUCATION

“Higher education Not what it used to be; American universities represent declining value for money to their students.” Economist. December 1, 2012. On the face of it, American higher education is still in rude health. In worldwide rankings more than half of the top 100 universities, and eight of the top ten, are American. The scientific output of American institutions is unparalleled. They produce most of the world’s Nobel laureates and scientific papers. Moreover college graduates, on average, still earn far more and receive better benefits than those who do not have a degree. Nonetheless, there is growing anxiety in America about higher education. A degree has always been considered the key to a good job. But rising fees and increasing student debt, combined with shrinking financial and educational returns, are undermining at least the perception that university is a good investment. Concern springs from a number of things: steep rises in fees, increases in the levels of debt of both students and universities, and the declining quality of graduates. Start with the fees. The cost of university per student has risen by almost five times the rate of inflation since 1983, making it less affordable and increasing the amount of debt a student must take on. Between 2001 and 2010 the cost of a university education soared from 23% of median annual earnings to 38%; in consequence, debt per student has doubled in the past 15 years. Two-thirds of graduates now take out loans. Those who earned bachelor’s degrees in 2011 graduated with an average of $26,000 in debt, according to the Project on Student Debt, a non-profit group. More debt means more risk, and graduation is far from certain; the chances of an American student completing a four-year degree within six years stand at only around 57%.

POLICY

“Blow Dealt to School Voucher Program.” Wall Street Journal. November 30, 2012. [For full story, go to Law & Public Policy].

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Lessons from a disadvantaged children’s charter school; Para Los Niños Charter School in an industrial part of downtown Los Angeles turns out to be a model for what upscale parents say they want for their children.” By Sandy Banks. Los Angeles Times. November 24, 2012. It’s not exactly where you might expect to find an example of public school success:The campus is in a former flower mart, across the street from the Greyhound station and a short walk from skid row in an industrial area of downtown Los Angeles. But inside the Para Los Niños Charter School, children defined by disadvantage are proving skeptics wrong. I paid a visit to the school last month, after I’d mentioned it in a column about an effort by parents in nearby South Park to create a new Metro Charter school for children living in the upscale neighborhoods near LA Live downtown. Some of those parents seem to have written off nearby Para Los Niños; it’s too poor, too Latino, too linguistically deprived to offer their children enough of a challenge. They are business owners, architects, technology creators, accountants — not elitists, just upscale high-achievers worried that their dreams and the school’s aspirations wouldn’t be a good fit. Those are the kinds of concerns on many middle-class minds. Para Los Niños is a magnified version of a city school system that gets less diverse and more economically challenged with every passing year. Of the 410 students on Para Los Ninos’ elementary campus, 99% are Latino and 96% hail from low income families. More than two-thirds of the students are not fluent in English.

PRIVATE & PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS

“Private School Goes All In With Tech.” By Sophia Hollander. Wall Street Journal. November 18, 2012. Educators have experimented with technology for decades, starting with dusty computer carts shoved into corners in the 1970s, but perhaps no school in the nation has integrated digital tools into the classroom on the scale of Avenues, which opened in September. Almost every aspect of Avenues involves cutting-edge technology, from audio-sensitive cameras on the walls intended to connect classrooms around the world to the replacement of most physical textbooks with multimedia versions accessible only on iPads (and frequently created by teachers). All students at the nursery school to 12th grade school have access to iPads, but starting in fifth grade, all are equipped with an iPad and a MacBook Air—an approach that some experts called unprecedented and, perhaps, redundant. There are 6,000 physical books at Avenues, but an additional 70,000 books, magazines and databases are available digitally, with plans to expand both collections. “Yes, there are students who love that physical book,” said Alia Methven, director of library services. “but that instant access of the virtual books is very appealing.” The school has a technology and library staff of 10—some have teaching backgrounds and are tasked with helping teachers use digital tools. Fusing technology into the classroom “was so baked into our DNA early on, it almost didn’t rise to the level of decision,” said Avenues CEO Chris Whittle. “If you’re going to be a modern school, you’re going to be advanced in this regard.” To be sure, Avenues may not be a model for cash-strapped school districts across the country. It raised $75 million from private donors before opening its doors and invested $2 million on technology infrastructure. The program’s operating budget, not including salaries, is $1 million and is funded in part by an annual $2,000 fee charged to every family on top of the school’s $39,750 tuition (the fee also covers lunch and other items).

HIGHER EDUCATION

“College of Future Could Be Come One, Come All.” By Tamar Lewin. New York Times. November 19, 2012. Teaching Introduction to Sociology is almost second nature to Mitchell Duneier, a professor at Princeton: he has taught it 30 times, and a textbook he co-wrote is in its eighth edition. But last summer, as he transformed the class into a free online course, he had to grapple with some brand-new questions: Where should he focus his gaze while a camera recorded the lectures? How could the 40,000 students who enrolled online share their ideas? And how would he know what they were learning? In many ways, the arc of Professor Duneier’s evolution, from professor in a lecture hall to online instructor of tens of thousands, reflects a larger movement, one with the potential to transform higher education. Already, a handful of companies are offering elite college-level instruction — once available to only a select few, on campus, at great cost — free, to anyone with an Internet connection. Moreover, these massive open online courses, or MOOCs, harness the power of their huge enrollments to teach in new ways, applying crowd-sourcing technology to discussion forums and grading and enabling professors to use online lectures and reserve on-campus class time for interaction with students. The spread of MOOCs is likely to have wide fallout. Lower-tier colleges, already facing resistance over high tuition, may have trouble convincing students that their courses are worth the price. And some experts voice reservations about how online learning can be assessed and warn of the potential for cheating. MOOCs first landed in the spotlight last year, when Sebastian Thrun, a Stanford professor, offered a free artificial-intelligence course, attracting 160,000 students in 190 nations. The resulting storm of publicity galvanized elite research universities across the country to begin to open higher education to everyone — with the hope of perhaps, eventually, making money doing so.

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Enrollment in Charter Schools Is Increasing.” By Motoko Rich. New York Times. November 14, 2012. Although charter schools engender fierce debate — most recently over ballot measures in Georgia and Washington State — their ranks are growing rapidly, according to a new report. Between 2010-11 and 2011-12, the number of students in charter schools increased close to 13 percent, to just over two million. The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, a nonprofit advocacy group, released the report on Wednesday. It showed that in some cities, charter schools — which are publicly financed but privately operated — enroll a significant proportion of public school students. New Orleans, where the city’s schools were essentially destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, leads the nation in the proportion of students in charter schools, at 70 percent. But in six other districts, including Detroit, Washington, D.C., and St. Louis, more than 30 percent of public school students attend a charter school. According to the report, in 110 school districts, at least 10 percent of students now attend public charter schools, up from 96 a year earlier. Opponents argue that charters drain public resources from traditional schools, and tend to attract motivated students, leaving behind those harder to educate. The performance of charter schools has been mixed, with some helping students achieve higher test results than traditional neighborhood schools, but many others delivering similar, or worse, results.

“Passage of charter schools amendment heartens some, worries others.” By Wayne Washington. Atlanta Journal-Constitution. November 11, 2012. With the bruising battle over the charter schools amendment in the state’s rear-view mirror, educators and politicians are focusing on what they believe comes next.
Many educators fear the future will include more demonizing of and less funding for traditional public schools. They also worry that the amendment’s passage will mean more charter schools and the hiring of more non-certified teachers to work in them. The politicians and others who backed the amendment see a back-to-the-future opportunity as it re-establishes a commission to consider charter school applications. They say the commission will spur local school boards to be more thoughtful about charter school applications and open the door to establishing more charter schools. It’s not clear how many charter school applications the commission will consider or how the state will cope financially if there is a flood of new charter schools. Georgia Superintendent John Barge estimated that the approval of seven charter schools per year — about as many as were approved by a similar charter commission that was killed by the Supreme Court in 2011 — would require the state to cough up $430 million over the next five years, based on per-pupil funding costs.

HIGHER EDUCATION

“’Enjoy the Unavoidable Suffering’; A generation of Chinese students draws inspiration from a hoax about Harvard.” By Robert Darnton. Wall Street Journal. November 15, 2012. Now that China has installed a new Communist Party elite to lead the country for the next decade, we might take stock of the misunderstandings and expectations that are likely to complicate Chinese-American relations. One is the apparent Chinese belief that America in general and Harvard in particular hold the secrets to success. As worthy of praise as many of our institutions are, I was dumbfounded recently by reading a list of “Allocutions on the wall of a Harvard library,” which is circulating through the Internet in China. “Allocution” means a formal address, but the Harvard wall writings, transmitted in millions of messages in Chinese and broken English, read like fortune-cookie aphorisms. For example, Allocution #1: “Nodding at the moment, you will dream. While studying at the moment, you will come true.” An entire generation of Chinese apparently imagines Harvard students grinding over their books, dozing off, and rallying to work harder by reading the writing on a library wall. As the university librarian, I can attest that no such writings exist on any of the walls at Harvard’s 73 libraries. Yet as a cultural historian, I find the imaginary allocutions fascinating. In most versions, they are alleged to contain 20 aphorisms, which some Chinese commentators describe as “commandments” that push Harvard students to ever-greater efforts. Thus we get: “Happiness may not be ranked, but success will at the top.” And: “Only earlier than others, more diligent efforts to taste the taste of success.”

“Mr. Yale, Tear Down This Hall; Connecticut Hall is a public monument to plagiarism.” Harvard Crimson. November 16, 2012. Yale’s website defines plagiarism as “the use of someone else’s work, words, or ideas as if they were one’s own.” It is a pity, then, that poor Reverend Thomas Clap—president of Yale from 1740-1766—didn’t live long enough to use the internet. Indeed, it is clear that Reverend Clap’s tenure belied the moral rectitude that his forbearers had intended to uphold by abandoning their alma mater for the Lyme Disease-infested fields of Connecticut. It was during the 26 debaucherous years of the Clap administration that Yale constructed that brazen monument to deceit and misrepresentation known today as Connecticut Hall. Connecticut Hall, constructed in 1752, bears, shall we say, a striking resemblance to a certain brick building wedged between Johnston Gate and Matthews Hall. What is its name? Oh, yes, Massachusetts Hall—and it was built 32 years earlier. Yalies have been griping for the better part of 311 years about living in the shadow of Harvard. Yet, how can they hope to escape unfavorable comparison to their neighbor to the north when the oldest building on their campus is but an inferior imitation of Massachusetts Hall? For the sake of integrity and for the sake of Yalie mental health, we recommend that Yale immediately demolish Connecticut Hall. One can imagine the conversation: “Hey, Eli, what should we name our new building?” “Gee, Gurdon, I’m fresh out of ideas! What’s the name of that pretty Harvard building what’s got all the bricks?” “I think they call it ‘Massachusetts Hall.’” “Oh, then we’ll call ours Connecticut Hall!” While imitation is the highest form of flattery, such brazen replication is uncreative at best and aesthetically offensive at worst.

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Olens says school boards can’t use taxpayer money to oppose charter amendment.” By Wayne Washington. Atlanta Journal-Constitution. October 3, 2012. schools amendment, Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens wrote in a letter to Superintendent John Barge Wednesday. His letter – which followed complaints about boards’ actions on that issue — doesn’t appear likely to end the argument. Rather than provide clarity, the letter itself became a sort of political Rorschach test, with amendment supporters and opponents interpreting it in starkly different ways. And superintendents and board members said they plan to press the case against an amendment they believe will lead to more charter schools and less money for traditional public schools. Several school boards, including those in Cherokee, Douglas, DeKalb and Gwinnett counties, have passed resolutions expressing their opposition to the proposed amendment that will be on the ballot in November. Some districts have also posted information on their Web sites that amendment backers say presents a negative view of the amendment. Supporters of the amendment have complained that board members violated Georgia law by using taxpayer resources to participate in a political campaign. Barge, an opponent of the amendment, sought clarity from Olens, who wrote that “local school boards do not have the legal authority to expend funds or other resources to advocate or oppose the ratification of a constitutional amendment by voters.” Atlanta attorney Glenn Delk, who complained to the state Board of Education that Barge and school boards were violating state law, said Olens’ letter is a vindication. He said the only correct interpretation of Olens’ letter would mean that school boards must rescind the anti-amendment resolutions they approved, and districts must remove anti-amendment information and replace it with a statement of neutrality.

EDUCATION REFORM

“Diane Ravitch Talks School Reform, the Chicago Strike, and the “Testing Vampire”.” By Abby Rapoport. American Prospect. October 1, 2012. Diane Ravitch is famous for two things: championing the education reform movement, then leading the opposition to it. The movement, which broadly supports an agenda that emphasizes student assessment (a.k.a. testing) and school choice (a.k.a. charter schools), has come to dominate American education policy. For the most part, both Democrats and Republicans now push to make school systems resemble economic markets. They want fewer teacher protections, more testing, and more charter schools for parents to choose from. President Obama’s Department of Education, headed by education reformer Arne Duncan, shares many policy goals with those of George W. Bush’s administration. Ravitch herself was once part of the movement, promoting student assessments and helping to create voluntary academic standards. After serving as Assistant Secretary of Education under George H.W. Bush, she held positions at the pro-school reform movement Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and was a member of the Koret Task Force at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, which focuses on school choice and “accountability.” But in 2009, Ravitch left both positions and wrote a book announcing her move to the other side of the debate. After seeing “how these ideas were working out in reality,” Ravitch writes in The Death and Life of the Great American School System, she began to change her views. She now opposes charter schools and high-stakes testing. She writes and speaks frequently about the dangerous role that for-profit businesses have assumed in shaping education policy, and about the simultaneous risk that wealthy non-profit foundations like the Gates Foundation have too much clout in policymaking. Along with actor Matt Damon, she helped organize of 2011′s Save Our Schools, a national rally opposing high-stakes testing and budget cuts to schools.
Related story:
“Diane Ravitch on the ‘Effort to Destroy Public Ed.’” By Abby Rapoport. American Prospect. October 2, 2012. Part 2 of the Prospect’s interview with the former assistant secretary of education.

HIGHER EDUCATION

“Online Education Grows Up, And For Now, It’s Free.” All Things Considered/National Public Radio. September 30, 2012. Online education isn’t particularly new. It has been around in some form since the 1990s, but what is new is the speed and scale in which online learning is growing. In barely a year, many of the most prestigious research universities in the world – including Stanford, Caltech, Oxford and Princeton — have started to jump onto the online bandwagon. For the students who never, ever would have had access to this kind of quality education from a place like Penn or Princeton or Stanford, they now have access to something. Those universities now offer classes through consortiums like Coursera, a tech company that’s partnered with more than 30 of the top universities in the world to offer online classes from its course catalogue — for free. Other companies offering online courses include Udacity and edX. More than 1.5 million students have enrolled in one of the classes offered by Coursera since it launched earlier this year. Initially, only about a dozen courses were available, but the site now lists close to 200 classes from 33 universities. Coursera was founded by Stanford computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller. Coursera is a for-profit company with $16 million in venture capital behind it. Eventually, it will look to turn a profit for those investors. Koller says one way might be to charge a fee for certification. Another, she says, is to help employers and organizations to close skills gaps. Where they are succeeding most, Koller says, is in improving the experience for all tiers of education: those in the university classrooms, students online and especially for those who would otherwise be without access to education.

“Faust Addresses Cheating Scandal.” By Hana N. Rouse and Justin C. Worland. Harvard Crimson. October 4, 2012. school year, University President Drew G. Faust lamented the influence of current societal pressures and their impact on learning during an interview with The Crimson on Tuesday. Faust, who has given few public statements on the controversy since news of it emerged in August, said that she fears that the desire for success causes students to miss out on the full benefits of a college education. “I think the world puts those pressures so clearly on students that we need to learning and the substance of learning is in itself,” Faust said. Faust said that though the root of the problem extends far beyond campus gates, the University has a role to play in keeping students engaged and interested in learning for learning’s sake. “It’s a kind of match between making sure we have intellectual excitement [in courses] and we have students who are interested in being intellectually excited,” she said. Harvard first launched an investigation of 125 students in Matthew Platt’s government course “Introduction to Congress” in May after teaching fellows suspected that students may have plagiarized answers or inappropriately collaborated on the class’ final take-home exam.

“Emory Confronts a Legacy of Bias Against Jews.” By Samuel G. Freedman. New York Times. October 6, 2012. University in Atlanta, Perry Brickman received a letter from the dean. It informed him that he had flunked out. Mr. Brickman was mystified. He had been a B-plus student in biology as an Emory undergraduate and had earned early admission to dental school. He had never failed a course in his life. Over the next few weeks of that summer, Mr. Brickman found out that three of his classmates had also been failed. All of them happened to be Jewish. Yet instead of fighting back, Mr. Brickman and his friends searched for other dental schools and swallowed a shame that lasted decades. Sixty years later, Mr. Brickman has helped to see belated justice done. In large part because of his personal research into the anti-Semitic record of Emory’s dental school, the university has invited many Jewish former students to a private meeting on Wednesday with its president, James W. Wagner, and that same night it will host the premiere of a documentary film about the scandal. The evidence of bias against Jewish students in Emory’s dental school under the reign of its dean, John E. Buhler, from 1948 to 1961 has been known for decades. Until now, however, the university had neither admitted the bias nor apologized for it.

EDUCATION

CHARTER SCHOOLS

“Push to Add Charter Schools Hangs Over Strike.” By Motoko Rich. New York Times. September 12, 2012. Of the issues that remain to be settled in the contract dispute here between the teachers’ union and the city, expanding charter schools is not officially on the table. But the specter of those plans — an oft-cited goal of Mayor Rahm Emanuel — hangs heavily over the teachers’ strike. “Even if it’s not explicitly something that we’re bargaining over,” said Jackson Potter, staff coordinator for the Chicago Teachers Union, “everyone knows it’s the elephant in the room.” While 350,000 students here remained out of school for the third day of the citywide teachers’ strike, about 50,000 who attend the city’s 96 charter schools went to class as usual. The charters, which are publicly financed but privately operated, are not required to hire unionized workers, and a majority of them do not. Experienced teachers at charter schools make about $15,000 to $30,000 less than their counterparts at traditional district schools, where the average salary is $75,000. Union members see the mayor’s vocal support for charters as of a piece with other initiatives that he has introduced, and that have led to the strike. Charters play a prominent role in a national education agenda for change that includes more rigorous teacher evaluations and challenges to union seniority, issues that have proved nettlesome in these negotiations. But here as in other cities across the nation, the role of charters ignites passions on both sides. Teachers regard them as a way for districts to undermine union protections, and say that underperforming schools are often closed before they have a chance to improve, and then are replaced with charters. Critics also argue that charter schools, which have open enrollment policies but often draw pupils from across a city, siphon away public financing and the most motivated students from neighborhood schools, leaving teachers in traditional public schools to work with the most needy students. Proponents, meanwhile, say that the charter schools offer parents much-needed alternatives to failing public schools.

HIGHER EDUCATION

“Harvard Could Face Student Lawsuits in Fallout of Cheating Scandal.” By Nathalie R. Miraval and Rebecca D. Robbins. Harvard Crimson. September 10, 2012. After Harvard issues verdicts to the roughly 125 undergraduates being investigated for academic dishonesty in Government 1310: “Introduction to Congress,” several lawyers predict that the University could face a slew of lawsuits from students facing punishment. One student currently under investigation said he may consider suing Harvard, depending on the outcome of his case. He said that he has already contacted a lawyer and has spoken to about ten others accused of academic dishonesty who have done the same. Lawyers and experts who specialize in higher education law said they expect that any students who choose to sue the University are most likely to claim that the Administrative Board did not properly follow its procedures as listed in the student handbook during the Government 1310 investigation. These lawsuits could have merit if Harvard “substantially” deviates from its delineated processes during the investigation, said Peter F. Lake ’81, a professor at Stetson University College of Law who specializes in higher education law. While administrative mistakes, such as misnumbered pages in procedural documents, will be unlikely to generate successful lawsuits, he said, students could have a valid legal case if administrators make more egregious errors, such as the denial of promised hearings. Lake added that he thinks problems could arise from the unusually high volume of students implicated in the investigation.
Related stories:
“Cheating Scandal To Be Reviewed Case-by-Case.” Harvard Crimson. September 11, 2012.
“At Harvard, Suspects in Cheating Take a Leave.” New York Times. September 11, 2012.
“Cheating case entangles athletes at Harvard; Basketball star leaving, aims for eligibility later.” Boston Globe. September 12, 2012.
“Song of the Cheaters.” New York Times. September 14, 2012.

“2 grateful graduates give $60m to Northeastern; Gift will bolster business school.” By Johanna Kaiser. Boston Globe. September 12, 2012. Two Northeastern University dropouts who went on to earn their degrees after encourage­ment from a mentoring professor are teaming up to donate $60 million to the university, a record gift aimed at shaping the next generation of entrepreneurs and innovators. The two said they hope their donation inspires others who have been helped by Northeastern to give back to the school. Richard D’Amore, cofounder of North Bridge Venture Partners in Waltham, and Alan McKim — founder of Clean Harbors, an environmental, energy, and industrial services provider in Norwell — are both university trustees. Northeastern “had a huge impact on my family,” said D’Amore, an Everett native with three siblings who also studied there. “Education means everything.” Northeastern, which will announce the donation Wednesday, plans to name its business school the D’Amore-McKim School of Business. The donation is a strong show of support for Northeastern’s mission and growth, school officials said. The university has seen the number of applications grow by more than 6,000 since 2010 and can boast this year of an incoming class with the highest average SAT scores in its history. Northeastern said the gift will help launch programs, ­attract top faculty, provide finan­cial aid to students, subsidize cooperative education programs that allow students to spend a semester working in their chosen industry, and offer more chances for students to study and work overseas.

“Hoboken School Engineers Expansion.” By Heather Haddon. Wall Street Journal. September 13, 2012. Stevens Institute of Technology is launching a 10-year expansion plan that it hopes will sharpen the engineering school’s focus and enlarge its undergraduate student body by nearly 60%. The proposal, to be unveiled Friday, includes a stronger focus on technology, hiring 100 professors and expanding undergraduate enrollment to 4,000 students from 2,550 currently. It is expected to cost at least $400 million to implement by 2022. Stevens President Nariman Farvardin on Friday also is expected to announce a $10 million gift from software executive Greg Gianforte, a Stevens alumnus, for a new academic building at the private university. With a campus perched on a Hoboken hill offering sweeping waterfront views of the Manhattan skyline, the Stevens expansion plan comes as other universities are stepping up their technology presence in the area. Cornell University won a New York City contest to build a new technology campus, and other schools, including New York University and Columbia University, are also expanding engineering programs.
Although Stevens is one of the oldest dedicated engineering schools in the country and counts among its alumni a Nobel Prize winner, artist Alexander Calder and a co-founder of Texas Instruments, few people outside the technology world know much about the school. Mr. Farvardin is looking to make Stevens better known and to heal some past grievances. In 2009, the state attorney general filed a 16-count civil lawsuit against Stevens on allegations of improper borrowing to fund its growth plan, misrepresenting its spending to its board and negligent financial mismanagement. Stevens countersued the state, and both sides settled in 2010 with Stevens undergoing monitoring from a state-appointed special counsel. The monitoring ended in February with Stevens in full compliance, according to the special counsel’s final report. Stevens also has had some acrimonious neighborhood relations in the past as the school has attempted to build in the one-square-mile sized city. But Mr. Farvardin is pledging to expand the school at a modest rate and has reached out to city stakeholders to involve them in the process.

PUBLIC SCHOOL PHILANTHROPY

“Chicago Teachers Strike: Wealthy Donors Changed Education Policy Landscape In Illinois.” By Joy Resmovits. Huffington Post. September 15, 2012. As the Chicago teachers strike edges toward its close, both sides of the education reform debate are trumpeting arguments for or against the strike and the policies put forward by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Beneath the rhetoric lies a stream of fundraising aimed at influencing lawmakers and the public on education policy that has, in recent years, shifted away from the teachers union and toward education reformers backed by some of the wealthiest members of Chicago’s elite. Stand for Children is a non-profit education reform group advocating for the inclusion of standardized test scores in teacher evaluations, charter schools and decreased teacher union power. Over the past three years, the group’s political action committee has raised more than $4 million and doled out more than $1 million to politicians, political parties and other political committees in Chicago and around Illinois. That’s more than double the $460,000 the Chicago Teachers Union PAC has given to political campaigns and other committees over the same period of time. While contributions from the Illinois Federation of Teachers bring the two sides into closer competition, much of IFT’s contributions went to a Supreme Court race in 2010. All of that money — raised from billionaires in hedge funds, private equity and real estate — has been used to push Stand for Children’s aggressive, hard-charging agenda, which assumes unionization often runs counter to the interest of education. Part of that agenda was attempting make it impossible for the Chicago Teachers Union to strike, though it only made the union more defiant.