Donors and School Reform (Stanley Katz)
Scholars, educators, and pundits have written often about well-funded foundations distributing cash to reform schools since the late-19th century. Diane Ravitch, Rick Hess, Sarah Reckhow, and Joanne Barkan, for example, have scolded, defended, and analyzed contemporary philanthropists who see public schools as a useful lever for improving children’s lives and correcting injustices. In this essay, Stanley Katz describe the history of giving to public schools and the decided shift in current philanthropy toward shaping federal and state policy.
Stanley N. Katz teaches public and international affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University and is president emeritus of the American Council of Learned Societies. This essay appeared in Stanford Social Innovation Review, Spring 2013
Twenty-five years ago, if I had been asked to describe the attitude of the major foundations toward education policy, my answer would have been that they were predictably supporting the reform ideas of the leading K-12 academic specialists, who were then concentrated in the best graduate schools of education, especially those
Stanley N. Katz teaches public and international affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University and is president emeritus of the American Council of Learned Societies. This essay appeared in Stanford Social Innovation Review, Spring 2013
Twenty-five years ago, if I had been asked to describe the attitude of the major foundations toward education policy, my answer would have been that they were predictably supporting the reform ideas of the leading K-12 academic specialists, who were then concentrated in the best graduate schools of education, especially those