Mar 12, 2009

Education Focus Blurs Lines for Philanthropy

by Laura Starita

In a speech before the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce this week, President Obama laid out a broad plan to improve education in the United States. Part of that plan will be implemented with stimulus dollars, five billion of which have been tagged for Early Head Start and Head Start programs. Other reforms proposed by the administration include removing limits on charter schools and introducing merit-based pay structures for public school teachers—both of which are controversial ideas within the Democratic party and beyond. The administration is at least saying that politics should not drive reform decisions. President Obama commented that his administration “will use only one test when deciding what ideas to support with your precious tax dollars. It’s not whether an idea is liberal or conservative but whether it works.”

There are no easy answers on what works to ensure that every citizen gets at least the opportunity of a strong education. Merit pay structures raise important questions about who is assessing merit—principals, students, parents, peers, or some combination of them, all of which are prone to different, non-canceling forms of bias. And both charter schools and merit pay perhaps place out-sized emphasis on what happens at school, while avoiding the contribution of the home and the cultural environment.

For philanthropists, such public investment should also stimulate discussion and consideration of where philanthropic dollars can best be leveraged to complement, or reduce the damage from, government investments. Should they go into the classroom—for enrichment subjects such as art, music, gym; should they go into the social environment that supports the student—such as mentoring; should they go into corollary fields which have an impact on learning—such as health promotion and parent coaching along the lines of what is provided by programs such as the Nurse-Family Partnership?