Philanthropic Advocacy for School Reforms
I … challenge the wisdom of giving public sanction and approval to the spending of a huge fortune ….My object here is to state as clearly and as briefly as possible why the huge philanthropic trusts, known as foundations, appear to be a menace to the welfare of society.
Frank Walsh, Chairman of the U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations, 1915
Yes, a century ago, Walsh pilloried the richest man in the world who had established a foundation in his name, John D.Rockefeller, in advancing his corporate interests–then in oil, coal, and scores of other enterprises–through his namesake foundation for being a “moulder of public thought.”
A century later, critics are making similar charges that donors to school reform (see here and here) shape the policy agenda of districts, states, and the federal government when it comes to improving the nation’s schools.
If you think I am suggesting that donors and criticism of their charity comes around again and again, you are on the money (see here and here). The cyclical nature of philanthropic grant-making by by both progressive-leaning and conservative-leaning foundations to advance different versions of urban reform–do any readers remember the Ford Foundation in the late-1960s funding decentralization in school reform and the harsh criticism the Foundation encountered including federal legislation in 1969?– is evident to me. As William Faulkner said: The past is not dead. In fact, it’s not even past.
How come?
There is a theory that when new organizations are born, they imprint the organizational goals, norms, and rules that last for decades as they mature and thrive even when the environment changes on them. Just like when naturalist Konrad Lorenz showed how new-born goslings saw him first and attached to him–following him everywhere for as long as they lived.
Those years in the early 20th century, then, of wealthy businessmen forming foundations to give away their fortunes to help others and getting criticized for pursuing their corporate interests of the day is where the Walsh committee’s censure of John D. Rockefeller enter the picture. Imprinted on these Philanthropic Advocacy for School Reforms | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice: