The following is a response to a Nov. 17 Wall Street Journal editorial:
NEW YORK, 17 November 2009 — The Wall Street Journal's editorial on reforming America's public schools is right to say that there has been a valuable generation of innovation in our schools. Charter schools and smart reforms by public schools have contributed to a new set of approaches for achieving great education for our children. We've learned that all our schools—public, charter, and private—need four basics in order to succeed: outstanding teaching, sufficient and well-designed learning time, money to pay for it, and strong accountability to make sure both money and time are used well and that our children are getting ahead.
The challenge now is how to bring this generation of innovation to scale for all our young people, especially in our poorest neighborhoods where the challenges are toughest and where few funders have focused resources. Many of the innovations noted in the editorial—successful charter schools and Teach for America, for example—are important illustrations of what's possible, but they lack broad-based impact. We need to find ways to bring the best innovations into every school.
Most of our $100 million in grants over the next seven years will go to entrepreneurs, parent and community organizations, and policy groups working to transform their schools from the ground up—not school districts or unions. We want communities to have the resources to be at the table and have their voices for change heard. Our belief is that empowering consumers, parents and students will help drive change.
One serious disagreement we have with the Journal's editors, however, is their vilification of teachers. The Journal illustrates exactly why the current recriminations-based debate is so counterproductive. How do you transform schools without our committed public school teachers? It's true we provided $500,000 to help the American Federation of Teachers get involved in reform efforts, but we were not alone; the Gates, Broad, Mott and other foundations have stepped up to support the same drive for innovation among teachers. We believe that the pace of reform will hasten if teachers are involved.
Most of the Journal's readers probably grew up at a time when public schools provided a very strong basis for success in life. We believe they can again. The solutions we embrace must work for the majority of students across the country, however, not only a lucky minority. We all know what's at stake for our kids and our country. We're betting that the challenges facing our public schools can be best tackled at the community level, where our funding will support fresh, courageous ways to implement the best ideas.
Sincerely,
Luis UbiñasPresident, Ford FoundationNew York
P.S.: On Ford Foundation history the Journal earns an "incomplete." While not all of our grants over the decades have yielded the progress we hoped, many far exceeded our ambitions. Sesame Street, the women's rights movement, the end of apartheid, the fight for freedom in Eastern Europe, and the launch of microfinance are just a few of the successes that began with Ford Foundation grants. If the Journal wants to critique our past, it should draw on all the facts.
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