November 7, 2008 | Read Time: 2 minutes
During the Philanthropy Roundtable’s annual meeting, Thomas W. Luce, a former assistant secretary of education under President Bush, said that philanthropy too often starts new programs to benefit schools, but needs to instead focus on growing education efforts that have already been proven to work.
“We have lit enough pilots that we ought to have a furnace somewhere,” he said. But “everybody likes to seize upon a new idea.”
Mr. Luce is now chief executive of the National Math and Science Initiative, in Dallas, which is working with states and nonprofit groups to expand nationwide public education projects that have demonstrated success locally. The organization has received support from the ExxonMobil oil company, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation.
“We don’t want to be the innovator,” he said about his group, but instead generate
“second-stage venture capital” for effective projects.
For example, the group has given a total of $13-million to six states to spread a Texas program that helps students enroll in Advanced Placement classes for science, math, and English. As part of the program, students who earn a score of 3 (out of 5) on Advance Placement tests receive cash rewards. Teachers are also rewarded financially for good test scores.
While such a program should be adopted by the federal government and other states, members of Congress and state lawmakers often want to provide money for their pet projects, instead of giving grants to the work of others, Mr. Luce said. “Legislators want to put their name on programs, not data,” he said.
And “philanthropy in general is almost as bad as legislators.”
What’s more, while he praised charter schools and school vouchers, he pushed donors to try and improve the public education system directly. “We can’t give up on public schools,” he said.
