Small Worldl: Interlocks of Boards and senior staff of the big 16 ed think tanks & advocacy orgs

[Hannah Bell]

The thumbnail image, which you should click on to enlarge, displays the relationships between the following organizations:

* Achieve
* Alliance for Excellent Education (Alliance)
* Broad Prize
* Center on Education Policy (CEP)
* Citizens’ Commission on Civil Rights (CCCR)
* Ed Next
* Ed Sector
* Ed Trust
* Fordham
* KIPP
* National Alliance for Public Charter Schools (NAPCS)
* National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ)
* New Leaders for New Schools (NLNS)
* New Schools Venture Fund (NSVF)
* New Teacher Project (NTP)
* Teach for America (TFA)


The education policy/advocacy world represented here looks a lot like a tangled spiderweb. Let me give a few examples.

The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools (NAPCS) shares members with 10 of these organizations. Their board includes

Jonathan Williams (Accelerated Charter School of Los Angeles), who also sits on the Education Sector board;

Bruno Manno (Vice Chair, Annie E. Casey Foundation), who also sits on the Ed Sector board as well as the Fordham board;

Mashea Ashton (of New Leaders for New Schools);

Mike Feinberg (KIPP);

Checker Finn, who also sits on the boards of Fordham and the National Council for Teacher Quality, and serves as the Senior Editor of Education Next;

Ted Mitchell of the New Schools Venture Fund (NSVF is also represented on the Ed Sector board);

Chris Nelson of the Don and Doris Fisher Fund, which is also represented on the Teach for America and KIPP boards;

Andy Rotherham, who sits on the boards of Education Sector, the National Council for Teacher Quality, and served on the Broad Prize Selection Committee.


What does it mean? Some would contend that a small group of people are running the education policy show. Others would argue this type of coordination is no different than in Fortune 500 companies, where board interlocks are common. Moreover, they might argue that interlocks, particularly in the case of service providing organizations, serve a useful purpose. Still others might note that this is simply a picture that observers should have in the back of their head when they listen to education policy debates and evaluate the claims made by these groups, i.e. can a think tank claim to be an independent evaluator given these interlocks?



Comments:

What's troubling about these connections is the degree to which these organizations serve as echo chambers for each other. One can be sure that whatever comes out of one of these organizations will be hyped to the skies by its friends elsewhere.

Each of these organizations compromises itself when it cites supporting evidence and opinions from elsewhere, without acknowledging being in bed with staff and board members from "elsewhere."

First, these organizations often give the impression of a grassroots groundswell of support for radical change in education. That may well be true, but this "small world" of interlocking advocacy groups should hardly be taken as evidence of this.

Second, the "indpendent analysis" of policy organizations such as Ed Sector or Ed Next really should not be considered "independent" at all. What kind of independent "analysis" should we expect of policies promoted by the very people who sit on these organizations' boards?



http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/eduwonkette/2008/02/its_a_small_world_after_all_1.html

[Hannah Bell]

1. National Alliance for Public Charter Schools Board

Mashea Mason Ashton
School: William & Mary '96, M.A.Ed. (Special Ed) '97
History: Vice Chair of the Alliance board, Partner with the Newark Charter School Fund, Executive Director for the New York Program, Senior Advisor for Charter School Policy for New Leaders for New Schools, Executive Director for Charter Schools for the New York City Department of Education, National Director of Recruitment, Midwest Director of Business Development for KIPP, Board Black Alliance for Educational Options, Wm & Mary Alumni Association. Several years as a special education teacher in Williamsburg, Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Husband: Kendrick F. Ashton, Jr., McCain fundraiser & Director, Perella Weinberg Partners LP

Perella Weinberg Partners L.P. is a boutique investment bank founded 2006 by Wall Street legends Joseph R. Perella and Peter Weinberg, specializes in corporate advisory and investment management services. "According to financial writer Michael Barone the company's reputation was threatened by the Barack Obama White House after it refused to accept a 33 cent on the dollar payment for their senior secured bonds made as an investment to keep Chrysler afloat prior to its 2009 bankruptcy."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perella_Weinberg_Partners

[Hannah Bell]

2. Joshua Edelman

School: Harvard, MA Stanford

Family: Son of Marion Wright Edelman (Children's Defense Fund); Father Peter Edelman, attorney, former legislative ass't to Robert Kennedy & many other government & other positions, e.g. Dean Georgetown Law.

History:

Deputy Chief of School Innovation (OSI) for the DC Public Schools

Executive Officer in the Chicago Public Schools’ Office of New Schools (Duncan hire), part of the Renaissance 2010 Charter initiative, where he closed "more public schools in Chicago than any executive in the 150-year history of public education in Chicago".

http://susanohanian.org/show_atrocities.php?id=8857

Got fired 9/09, apparently because the Chicago experiment was showing poor results & his own political missteps:

http://michaelklonsky.blogspot.com/2009/09/huberman-gives-his-charter-school-chief.html.

District of Columbia Public Schools; SEED Foundation (DC) for seven years (Charters), principal of the SEED Public Charter School in Washington DC (2001-2006), the country’s only public, urban, boarding school and an Academic Advisor to the SEED Foundation from 2006-2007.

Teacher and administrator at Milton Academy (Boston private school for rich kids), social studies teacher at Menlo-Atherton High School California)

[Hannah Bell]

3. John Gee

John Gee

Executive Director of the Wisconsin Charter Schools Association.

CEO of the Information Technology Association of Wisconsin
Business developer for the Academic Advanced Digital Co-Lab (computerized ed)
Founder NASA Ames Technology Commercialization Center, a business incubator
Chairman and CEO of another statewide association, the Information Technology Association of Wisconsin (ITAWi).
Developer, Beaver Creek, CO, (private city and world class ski resort, part of Vail Associates, Inc.)
Eagle County School Board, CO.

http://www.beavercreekresortcompany.com/BCRC/
http://www.beavercreek.com/

[Hannah Bell]

4. Joel Klein

School: Columbia, Harvard Law
Family:
2nd Wife (after 2006) Nicole Seligman = General Counsel for CEO of Sony, attorney for Clinton in Whitewater/Lewinsky matters, Hilary Clinton campaign team; former Williams & Connoly partner (Microsoft antitrust, Enron suits, Iran-Contra, Hinckley/Reagan)
Sister-in-law Stephanie Seligman = partner Wachtell, Lipton; mergers & acquisitions. Wachtell Lipton = most profitable law firm/partner in the world.
The Seligman sisters grew up on 5th Avenue NYC, children of corporate counsel Seligman & Seligman.

History:
-NY Chancellor of Education (Bloomberg appointee)
-Former counsel to Bertelsmann, transnational German media corp (privately held, Mohn family: Owner Heinrich Mohn and his son Reinhard Mohn (1921-2009) were both members of the SS.)
-US Asst Attorney General: Microsoft Antitrust
-Office of white house counsel, Clinton Admin

[Smarmie Doofus]

5. Caroline Kennedy got her gig at Klein's DOE thru Seligman.

>>>>>The Seligman sisters grew up on 5th Avenue NYC, children of corporate counsel Seligman & Seligman.>>>>>

Who would have been her neighbor growing up on 5th Ave.

If memory serves: they were walking on the beach in Hyannis Port making idle conversation and Caroline became an "education advocate" all of a sudden.

She nearly rode that horse to the US Senate.

Great to know that public education is in such capable and disinterested hands.

Or should I say "uninterested".

[Hannah Bell]

6. Caroline was Nicole Seligman's college roommate. Or so I read. Radcliffe.

Seligman also has a decidedly glamorous and high-society side. She was a bridesmaid at the wedding of Caroline Kennedy, whose college dormitory living room adjoined Seligman's dorm room, and represents both Kennedy children. She has dated on and off for years Eli S. Jacobs, an investor 20 years her senior who once owned the Baltimore Orioles but sold the team when he filed for personal bankruptcy.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/clinton/stories/seligman081798.htm

[Hannah Bell]

9. Christopher Nelson: Managing Director , Doris & Donald Fisher Fund

History: Managing Director of the Doris & Donald Fisher Fund (the Fund), a San Francisco-based philanthropy created by Doris and Donald Fisher, founders of the Gap, Inc.

Fisher Fund's Don Fisher (died 9/09):

Fisher has been active in several public education causes, including being a major contributor to KIPP charter schools—a national network of low-income, high-achieving college preparatory public charter schools: he is the chairman of the board of trustees of the KIPP Foundation, the non-profit central organization of the KIPP network. He is also a contributor to Teach For America, GreatSchools.net, and EdVoice, a state-wide coalition of California business leaders and others who support education reform. Fisher also serves on the California State Board of Education.

In 2000, Fisher, an investor in Edison Schools (a for-profit educational management organization), was found to be funneling "soft money" into the campaigns of pro-Edison board members during San Francisco's school board election on whether to break contract with Edison...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Fisher

Attorney with Keker & Van Nest in San Francisco; specialized in complex business litigation, intellectual property matters, state and federal government investigations, and white-collar criminal defense.

Board: California Charter Schools Association.

[Hannah Bell]

10. Honorable Bart Peterson

School: Purdue, U of Mich law

History: Vice President - Corporate Affairs and Communications , Eli Lilly and Company (10th largest pharmacorp).

Managing Director of Strategic Partners Urban Fund formed by Strategic Capital Partners LLC to invest in underserved urban communities in cities across the country.

Indianapolis Mayor 2000-2007: introduced charter school initiative

Chief of Staff for governor Evan Bayh

Founder, The Precedent Companies, a group of real estate development and financial services companies (1995-1999).

[Hannah Bell]

11. Honorable Margaret Spellings

School: U of Texas

U.S. Education Secretary from 2005 to January, 2009.

Significant accomplishment: NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND

Assistant to the Bush for Domestic Policy
Senior Advisor to Governor George Bush with responsibilities for education reform in TX.

Currently President and CEO of Margaret Spellings and Company, a public policy and consulting firm.

Husband: Robert Spellings, DC attorney & charter lobbyist in TX.

Celebrity Jeopardy contestant.

[jotsy]

7. Why do I fear the u-scan approach at the grocery store is about to

take form in our schools?

[proud2BlibKansan]

8. That is such a great analogy!

:thumbsup: