Gates Fund Names Head of Education Program

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has announced the appointment of Vicki L. Phillips, superintendent of Portland Public Schools in Oregon, to be director of its education program.

Ms. Phillips will oversee and expand upon the foundation’s education-related grants. The foundation has given approximately $3.4-billion for causes related to education.

Also, read The Chronicle of Philanthropy’s interview with Tom Vander Ark, Ms. Phillips’s predecessor, shortly after he left the Gates Foundation to became the president of the X Prize Foundation, a Santa Monica, Calif., charity that offers multimillion-dollar purses to encourage individuals, nonprofit groups, and businesses to develop solutions to some of the world’s biggest problems.

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