Celebrating Black History Month by Investing $1M to Diversify Education Leadership

I always enjoy Black History Month.  It’s a time to recognize and honor the many contributions of Black Americans to our country. But this year, I’m especially happy because I’ll also get a chance to help make some new history — by supporting the next generation of diverse leaders in education. It is no coincidence […]

Relay GSE Increases Staff Diversity Over Three Years

Relay is deeply committed to creating a diverse institution that respects difference and is inclusive of its communities. Using the From Intention to Action Report, Relay took concrete steps to increase staff diversity, with a strong focus on senior leadership. Through a three-year strategic plan, ongoing all-staff trainings, senior leadership involvement, and expanded recruitment efforts, […]

Forward Movement, but Miles to Go

Only 20% of US nonprofit board members are people of color.  50% of the candidates Charter Board Partners matched to charter school boards in Washington, DC in the past year are people of color. These new board members not only bring important expertise, but also the needed perspectives of their communities. We still have a long way […]

Impact of “From Intentions to Actions” Report

Reaction to From Intention to Action, a survey and report developed by Koya Leadership Partners and Education Pioneers, shows that the work of building a social and business case for diverse teams in education is behind us. What’s next is implementing clearly articulated, measurable strategies for increasing diversity. Our report offers highly actionable steps any […]

Charter Board Partners Diversifies its Board

At Summit 2014, CBP pledged to “COMMIT” to making our board more diverse, modeling the commitment to diversity that we ask of charter school boards. Our goal: add two board members with high-priority skills and expertise who are Black or Latino.  We are thrilled that we have since added two Black board members who bring […]

Our Commitment to Diversifying Education

Many education reformers ask, “Why should we focus on closing the demographic gap between the children we serve and the leaders of the ed reform movement?” Our answer is simple. Research shows that diversity matters, and a sustainable education reform movement requires a community to participate in its own liberation to achieve the practice of […]

Welcoming Equal Opportunity Schools to the NewSchools Family

Today, NewSchools welcomes Equal Opportunity Schools to its portfolio with an investment of $250,000. Equal Opportunity Schools joins the NewSchools portfolio as an EDge investment, which explores the freshest ideas improving education for underserved students and enables amazing entrepreneurs working outside the scope of our Seed, Learning to Teach, and City Funds in Boston, DC, Newark, and Oakland.

Welcome Zach Levine, Learning to Teach EIR

How are we meant to prepare our children for a harder future when we don’t have enough teachers, let alone qualified ones, to inspire them?

This is a crisis. A crisis of both quantity and quality of the most important ingredient for a first-rate education system. Fortunately many have heeded the call and are working hard to address this serious but solvable issue, including our new Learning to Teach Entrepreneur in Residence, Zach Levine.

I’m thrilled to welcome Zach to NewSchools and thankful that he’s working with us to found ElevatED, a new nonprofit that adds to the shared mission of NewSchools and our partners to improve STEM education by building a cadre of great STEM teachers.