Not Very Giving
By ROB REICH
Published: September 4, 2013
TANFORD, Calif. — AS school gets rolling across the country, many parents will be asked to make a large financial contribution to their children’s school. In Hillsborough, Calif., for example, parents receive a letter from the Hillsborough Schools Foundation in which the amount requested is $2,300 per child.
Maëlle Doliveux
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There have always been parent-teacher associations that raise modest or even not-so-modest amounts of money. But increasingly local school foundations are being created expressly for the purpose of raising private funds.
Hillsborough is one of the wealthiest towns in the United States. Median family income is over $250,000, and residents enjoy one of the best school districts in the state. It’s not hard for Hillsborough families to donate to their own children’s school. And they do: bids at the foundation’s annual online auction last year went into the thousands for a paid internship at Franklin Templeton Investments and for a trip to the taping of the final episode of “The Bachelor.” Or you could make an offer on a vacation in a luxury home with a dedicated butler on a private island in Belize.
According to the foundation, charitable gifts have financed class-size reductions, librarians, art and music teachers, and Smart technology in every classroom. These funds supplement the annual public spending of $13,500 per pupil. In the process, they increase property values in Hillsborough. In 2012 private contributions to the foundation amounted to $3.45 million, or $2,300 per pupil.
Hillsborough is not an anomaly. The foundation supporting the Palo Alto school district