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In the fall of 2010, Mark Zuckerberg announced on Oprah that he'd be making a generous gift to Newark, New Jersey.
As Oprah said in her Oprah way, "one ... hundred ... million ... dollars" would be given to Newark Mayor Cory Booker and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie as the three began the Startup: Education foundation.
The plan was to turn Newark into what Zuckerberg called "a symbol of educational excellence for the whole nation," spent on retaining the best teachers, and creating environments that would produce successful students and, one day, graduates.
...
Between 2010 and 2012, The New Yorker reports that "more than twenty million dollars of Zuckerberg’s gift and matching donations went to consulting firms with various specialties: public relations, human resources, communications, data analysis, [and] teacher evaluation." Many of the consultants were being paid upwards of $1,000 a day.
“Everybody’s getting paid but Raheem still can’t read," Vivian Cox Fraser, president of the Urban League of Essex County, was quoted saying.
I read through the long article on this. Charter schools were doing well. Newark schools with tons money thrown into the pot still were still failing. Also the lives for the kids outside of school were affecting their performance. Then the unions had to have their money.
There are so many issues there - that money can't solve. The experts seem to be in the charter schools.
The district and the Newark Teachers Union did eventually settlea momentous contract, with the Zuckerberg money helping pay for bonuses of upto $12,500 for high-performing teachers.
The Zuckerberg money went elsewhere, too, according toRussakoff, much of it to consultants in the district.
During the next two years, more than$20 million of Zuckerberg’s gift and matching donations went to consultingfirms with various specialties: public relations, human resources,communications, data analysis, teacher evaluation.
Many of the consultants had workedfor [former New York City schools chancellor] Joel Klein, Teach for America,and other programs in the tight-knit reform movement, and a number of them hadcontracts with several school systems financed by Race to the Top grants andventure philanthropy. The going rate for individual consultants in Newark was athousand dollars a day. Vivian Cox Fraser, the president of the Urban League ofEssex County, observed, “Everybody’s getting paid,but Raheem still can't read.”
Teachers worked closely with children who couldn’t keep up, and many of them saw improvement, but the effects of children’s traumas outside school posed bigger problems. The father of a student in Shakel Nelson’s fifth-grade math class had been murdered early in the school year. When Nelson sat beside his desk and encouraged him, he sometimes solved problems, but as she moved on he put his head down and dropped his pencil. A girl who was excelling early in the year stopped trying when her estranged, emotionally disturbed parents resumed contact and began fighting.
A good family structure is hardly ever mentioned as to why urban school districts are failing. It's hard for adults to focus properly when one's world is in turmoil - kids definitely won't be able to cope easily with murder, drugs, dangerous situations, etc. The liberals who care so much about the poor NEVER address this. As I have said before, Obama let a golden opportunity pass to REALLY help black people in urban areas lift themselves up. He could have been on par with ML King. This is his biggest sin to me.
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Again, charter schools are the experts.
In fact, there was a pot of gold, but much of it wasn’t reaching students. That was the reformers’ main argument against the wasteful administrations of urban schools. More than half of the Newark district’s annual budget paid for services other than instruction—often at inordinate prices. Charter schools received less public money per pupil, but, with leaner bureaucracies, more dollars reached the classroom.
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I applaud Zuckerberg's willingness to help... but it can't be done through the government. He didn't make his money through the government. He probably could have used a quarter of that money and provided scholarships for those people to attend charter schools.
In the end, especially if you read thru part III of the long article, the government is an inefficient means to solve large scale problems. They just can't be trusted.
Zuck can afford to crap his money away however he chooses. The real issue is how NJ taxpayers are being robbed of their hard earned money by siphoning it to Abbott Districts, with absolutely zero data showing improvement by students in those districts.
But, it makes the Libs feel good.
First of all, you give money to Unions don't expect much as far as results.
And no matter what stupid liberals say, all you have to do is open your eyes to see the government can't spend efficiently or effectively. Everything they do ends up taking longer, is more expensive, and more often than not... is just horribly inefficient. Yet it is the Democratic party, that insists on even MORE government projects, power, and spending. How idiotic can you be?! You morons are destroying this country
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