BREAKING NEWS

Now Available: Experience the 2004 Annual Conference Online!

Grantmakers for Education's annual conference in Atlanta featured spirited discussions and exceptional speakers. Digital audio recordings of plenary sessions and PowerPoint presentations from breakout sessions are now available online at http://www.edfunders.org/programs/conference/presentations04.asp.

Check Your Mailbox Lately?: Latest Issue of the GFE Newsletter

The most recent issue of GFE's newsletter, Notebook, was mailed in mid-October. Among other features, it includes an assessment by Jack Jennings for how the 2004 election results may impact the No Child Left Behind Act. Look for Notebook in your mailbox or download it from http://www.edfunders.org/downloads/_protected/GFE_Newsletter_Fall04.pdf.

UPCOMING GFE PROGRAMS AND ACTIVITIES

Save the Date: How Grantmakers Can Foster Union-District-Community Collaborations to Close the Achievement Gap (February 10, 2005 — New York City)

This full-day GFE member briefing will the challenges and successes grantmakers encounter when using their resources to encourage collaboration among unions, districts and communities aimed at better student results. It will also provide a forum for the exchange of opinions and perspectives on the role of unions in grant-funded reforms. Look for more details in December.

REPORTS WORTH READING

The Afterschool Investments Project

The Afterschool Investments Project has made two after-school resources available on their website. The first, State Afterschool Profiles (http://www.nccic.org/afterschool/statep.html), provides a snapshot of the state of after-school as well as opportunities to compare after-school activities across the country. The profiles provide key data about the field and are designed to serve as a resource for policymakers, funders and providers. The second resource — Creating a Vision for Afterschool Partnerships (http://nccic.org/afterschool/visioning-tool.pdf) — is being offered in response to the need for new community partnerships given changes in federal funding of after-school programs under the No Child Left Behind Act. The tool is designed to help stakeholders understand their roles in a new after-school partnership by emphasizing the need to plan and develop a thoughtful vision statement.

Crisis at the Core: Preparing All Students for College and Work

ACT — provider of education and workforce development services and college entrance exam administrator — has released a new report concluding that many high school graduates do not have all of the skills to succeed in college-level coursework or workforce training. Among the report's findings: only 22 percent of the 1.2 million high school graduates who took the ACT assessment in 2004 achieved scores that would deem them ready for college in all three basic academic areas — English, math and science — and similar assessments for eighth and tenth graders suggest they will be no better prepared at graduation. The publication argues that students at all levels of achievement can benefit from taking rigorous courses. And, observed test score increases show that certain advanced science and math courses have a strong impact on student performance and college readiness. As a result of its findings, ACT is now launching a national demonstration project that will focus on course quality and rigor. http://www.act.org/path/policy/pdf/crisis_report.pdf

The Funding Gap 2004

This report by The Education Trust seeks to provide a complete picture of funding gaps between the highest-poverty school districts and the lowest-poverty school districts across the country. After narrowing in better economic times, the financial gap between poor and wealthy school districts now stands at its widest point in at least five years, the report concludes. The Education Trust finds that — adjusting for the higher cost of educating low-income students — high-poverty school districts in 36 states receive fewer dollars than low-poverty districts and that 35 states provide fewer dollars per student to their districts serving high proportions of minority students. The report also identifies states that devote a relatively small share of their resources to education. http://www2.edtrust.org/NR/rdonlyres/30B3C1B3-3DA6-4809-AFB9-2DAACF11CF88/0/funding2004.pdf

High School Reform: Using Rigorous Evidence to Improve Policy and Practice

Earlier this year, MDRC co-convened a national gathering of researchers, policymakers, government officials and school administrators to define and discuss the research-related issues, questions and concerns in high school reform. Issues included: what has been learned about approaches thus far, how can the field of education maximize the role research can play in informing practice and policy, and what major studies are under way to evaluate various high school reform programs and the emerging results? MDRC has issued a report that provides a summary of the deliberations and includes three papers — by Larry Cuban, David Stern and Jean Yonemura Wing, and Alfred Hess — that were commissioned for the meeting. Two future convenings will involve a broader group of individuals from the field, with the goal of better connecting research findings to policy and practice. http://www.mdrc.org/publications/391/conf_report.pdf

San Diego Schools Review

Since 1998, San Diego City Schools has been implementing the longest-running, continuously led urban reform agenda — known as Blueprint for Student Success — in an effort to increase student achievement, close the achievement gap among racial/ethnic groups and modernize and streamline business operations in the district. In order to assess what the district has achieved, the challenges ahead, and how the district should proceed in the future, this district commissioned a comprehensive research effort that is engaging more than a dozen education experts and researchers. Their collaborative work, the San Diego Review, provides 18 working papers — addressing everything from union relationships to business services — that critique and scrutinize the progress of reforms undertaken during Superintendent Alan Bersin's tenure. http://www.sdcs.k12.ca.us/events/SDReview/#2

Tapping the Potential: Retaining and Developing High-Quality New Teachers

According to the Alliance for Excellent Education's report, one out of every two new teachers will quit within five years and about 207,000 teachers, nearly 6 percent of the teaching workforce, did not return to teaching this fall. The report shows that comprehensive induction — defined as including high-quality mentoring, common planning time, ongoing professional development, an external network and standards-based evaluation — cuts attrition rates in half and develops new teachers more rapidly into highly skilled, experienced professionals. Induction has been shown to create a payoff of $1.37 for every one dollar invested; however, only one percent of beginning teachers currently receive the ongoing training and support that constitutes comprehensive induction when they enter the teaching profession. The report also includes policy recommendations, in-depth analysis of new teacher induction practices and four case studies of effective induction programs: Connecticut BEST, Santa Cruz New Teacher Project (CA), Tangipahoa FIRST (LA) and The Toledo Plan (OH). http://www.all4ed.org/publications/TappingThePotential/index.html

PEOPLE

Deva Hirsch has resigned as vice president of programs at the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation.

The Board of Directors for Grantmakers for Education has elected Lori Bezahler of The Edward W. Hazen Foundation, Ramon Rodriguez of BellSouth Foundation, Sandra Treacy of the W. Clement and Jessie V. Stone Foundation, and Tom Vander Ark of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as new directors for the organization. GFE thanks retiring members — Warren Chapman of Bank One, Kathy Klock (formerly with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation), Sophie Sa of the Panasonic Foundation and Tom Wacaster of the Phil Hardin Foundation — for their contributions and commitment during their board tenure. In addition, Barbara Chow from the National Geographic Society Education Foundation was elected as board co-chair.

KnowledgeWorks Foundation announced the promotion of three current Program Directors to newly created Vice President positions: Harold Brown, Barbara Diamond and Brett Visger will be leading the School Improvement, Communities & School Facilities and College & Career Access, respectively. In addition, the foundation has recently appointed Monica Martinez to the new position of senior fellow.

DEVELOPMENTS IN THE FIELD

The most recent newsletter of The Association of Small Foundations reviews the nonprofit regulation reforms proposed by the Senate Finance Committee earlier this year. Although no changes were adopted by Congress, the issues likely will be raised again next year. Visit ASF's website to view the article, "Foundation Reform Begins to Stir in the Senate".

In 2002, three Pittsburgh foundations made national headlines when they announced their suspension of grantmaking to the local school district because of concerns over "a sharp decline of governance, leadership and fiscal discipline." Now, two years later, the foundations report they see encouraging signs of change in the district and have resumed funding for select activities. The annual report from one of the foundations — The Heinz Endowments — includes an assessment of what's changed and what philanthropy can learn from this event. http://www.heinz.org/files/SP04_MakingTheGrade.pdf

John A. Johnson Achievement Plus Elementary School, located in Saint Paul, Minnesota, is the first recipient of KnowledgeWorks Foundation's Richard W. Riley Award for Excellence, an award given to a school that best exemplifies the growing trend to build schools as centers of community. http://www.nationalschoolsearch.org/

JOB ANNOUNCEMENTS

Water Funders Group Coordinator
Environmental Grantmakers Association
Location: New York, NY / Deadline: November 30, 2004

President
Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers
Location: Washington, DC / Deadline: Decision to be made by end of 2004

Administrative Manager
Funders Concerned About AIDS
Location: New York, NY / Deadline: None

Senior Program Officer, Education
The George Gund Foundation
Location: Cleveland, OH / Deadline: Decision to be made by December 2004

Executive Director
Panasonic Foundation
Location: Secaucus, NJ / Deadline: November 30, 2004

Associate Director - Policy
The Pisces Foundation
Location: San Francisco, CA / Deadline: None