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We’re moving!

We’re moving. NewSchools’ Bay Area offices have been situated in San Francisco’s SoMa neighborhood since education innovation involved smoother slate and sharper chalk. Come the end of this week, we’re moving to the other side of the Bay, atop Oakland’s 19th Street BART station. We’ll be thrilled to be in a neighborhood that is home to so many of our fellow education reform organizations. The move to Oakland is a good one fiscally […] Read more

The NewSchools Seed Fund

NewSchools Venture Fund is excited to announce the launch of the Seed Fund, an initiative to support high-impact, K-12 education technology companies. We’ve been supporting education entrepreneurs for 13 years through four funds and have invested over $180 million dollars in some of the leading education organizations—including, Aspire, KIPP, BetterLesson, GreatSchools, Revolution Foods and Education Elements. We’ve had the great privilege of collaborating with many entrepreneurs during the earliest stages—including Don Shalvey […] Read more

Educreations Policy Update

NewSchools Policy Director Ben Riley provides a great overview of two new education bills that were introduced last Friday, January 6 in the House Education and Workforce Committee. In his short video, Ben provides a run-down of the Student Success Act and the Encouraging Innovation & Effective Teachers Act. Ben’s using a great new app called Educreations, which allows users to create video “lessons” à la Khan Academy. (Their tagline is “Teach what you know. […] Read more

Grading the New York Times on Education Technology

This morning, the New York Times had the latest in its occasional series, “Wouldn’t It Be Nicer If There Were No Technology in Schools” –wait, sorry, I read it wrong, the correct title is “Grading the Digital School.” The piece, titled “Teachers Resist High-Tech Push in Idaho Schools,” reveals that a new law in Idaho “requires all high school students to take some online classes to graduate, and that the students and […] Read more

#takethetest

It’s not often that I wake up in the morning, read the blogs, and find a whole lot of common ground with Valerie Strauss’s “Answer Sheet” in the Washington Post. On days when she is quoting the New York Times’ Michael Winerip, it’s even less likely.So, in the holiday spirit of cheer and peacemaking, I’m delighted that just before the year runs out, the moment has arrived, in the form of an […] Read more

Of course class matters. Schools matter too.

A recent piece on the New York Times op-ed page, which somehow didn’t get much immediate attention, ranks in the view of this jaded sometimes-ed-writer as one of the most troubling articles on education reform of 2011.The December 11 op-ed, by Duke public policy professor Helen Ladd and former New York Times education editor Edward Fiske, was headlined “Class Matters. Why Won’t We Admit It?” It makes a few points that ought […] Read more

2011 Year in Review

As 2011 comes to a close, we’re taking stock of our successes and challenges throughout the year. Here are just a few highlights:  In 2011, schools in the NewSchools portfolio served more than 115,000 students—equal to the 33rd largest school district in the country. Upon graduation, 90% of them will go on to college.  This year, we invested more than $17 million dollars in innovative entrepreneurial organizations working to make a difference for students from low-income communities. Our […] Read more

Teaching Practice

This weekend, the Times ran a story on legal training that echoed recent reports on the shortcomings of teacher education.  In it, David Segal writes: Law schools have long emphasized the theoretical over the useful, with classes that are often overstuffed with antiquated distinctions, like the variety of property law in post-feudal England. Professors are rewarded for chin-stroking scholarship, like law review articles with titles like “A Future Foretold: Neo-Aristotelian Praise of Postmodern […] Read more

The Latest GREAT News

The ayes have it! Last Thursday, the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee approved Senator Michael Bennet’s GREAT Amendment to the omnibus ESEA reauthorization bill by voice vote. (For more background on GREAT, you can read previous blog posts here, here and here – the essential idea is to improve teacher and principal training by focusing on admissions selectivity, clinical training, and accountability tied to student achievement.)For those who weren’t riveted […] Read more