In this article, the authors utilize core ideas from Critical Race Theory (CRT) to examine the nature of education reform in two river cities. Similar to other cases of education reform in urban districts, the reforms in the two focal cities reflect at least four characteristics in common: (1) a form of portfolio management; (2) the growth of…

Ten years ago, MDC's report, "The State of the South 2007: Philanthropy as the South's 'Passing Gear,'" (ED519455) examined how philanthropy can accelerate progress toward a South that is both equitable for all its residents and competitive with other regions of the country. A decade later, our second iteration, commissioned by the…

In this paper we illustrate the relationships between Teach For America (TFA) and federal charter school reform to interrogate how policy decisions are shaped by networks of individuals, organizations, and private corporations. We use policy network analysis to create a visual representation of TFA's key role in developing and connecting…

The rise in the influence of and spending by educational philanthropists and foundations over the past two decades, especially in the area of market-based reforms, such as charter schools, vouchers, and merit pay, is evident across the United States. Largely due to philanthropic investments, relatively new educational intermediary organizations…

The latest wave of reform in urban schools, led by the venture philanthropists, has made a great deal of change, without much progress. Foundations with a venture philanthropy bent, like the Walton Family Foundation, the Gates Foundation, and the Broad Foundation, say market principles, such as choice and competition, will improve schools. If…

After an initial inventory of community indicators in its 2008 Shreveport-Bossier City "Community Counts" annual report, the Community Foundation of Shreveport-Bossier decided to focus existing funding related to children and families on the areas of education, health, and poverty, as well as develop new funds in these areas. These focal…

In 2008, the Shreveport-Bossier Community Foundation selected education, health, and poverty as funding priorities. But the foundation realized that it needed more specific guidelines on how best to distribute grants. RAND developed a framework for making investment decisions that incorporates the best of traditional decision making approaches.…

"Between Public and Private" examines an innovative approach to school district management that has been adopted by a number of urban districts in recent years: a portfolio management model, in which "a central office oversees a portfolio of schools offering diverse organizational and curricular themes, including traditional public…

Backed with political and financial capital, advocates of change push to improve America's education system. For most people, the purpose of education is self-improvement--becoming better informed, more knowledgeable, better equipped to solve problems, more able to earn a living and prosper. The more effectively an education system delivers on…

This report examines the relationship between philanthropy and public schools in Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas served by the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL). While begun as a project to build understanding and to support institutional planning, this report speaks also to local school leaders, the…

This annual report defines three broad areas in which the Southern Education Foundation supports research. The first looks to what kinds of teachers will be needed in the future; the second asks how our best thinking can be translated into effective action; and the third asks how seamless education can be. Programs subsumed under education and…