Reflections on Amplify’s Common Knowledge Profit Potential
In this post, I would like to offer my response to this information included as part of Diane Ravitch’s post on my exchange with Common Knowledge (CK) founder E.D. Hirsch. Regarding my strong statements on Amplify’s profit motive, Hirsch writes the following:
The only way Amplify can make money from CK Pre-K-through 3 is if a school or district doesn’t want to bother with printing, and therefore orders from them. But this also means that Amplify would need to offer the materials at an attractive price.
And there’s another twist you could not have known about. We were pretty good bargainers on behalf of the public in this deal. Amplify helped pay for the development of grade 3. But we insisted grade 3 also got put up for free.
You need to consult with Amplify where they expect to make money from all this. They are underwriting the development costs of grades 4 and 5, and our contract with them is a regular 20 year publisher’s contract with royalties to CKF. They probably hope that having the whole pre-K 5 package, with pre-k 3 available for free will make 4 and 5 attractive. You’ll have to ask them. Our view is: we want the get these