Can Innovation Drive Reform?

May 19, 2009

Stephen Colbert didn’t moderate, but Dr. Roland Fryer an economist at Harvard University and director of Harvard’s Education Innovation Lab participated in a plenary debate titled “Innovation as a Driver of Reform” at Summit. Fryer, a big proponent of innovation calls the achievement gap a civil rights issue and sees innovation as a way to drive reform. Right now he’s working in Chicago, New York, and Washington, DC and is implementing a program that incents kids to do well academically–in Chicago at-risk students get $50 per class.

How do you think he’d spend $1B is about to spent by foundations and the US Department of Education in support of innovation?