Bill Gates backed 9 of 12 of the RTTT winners. $250,000 each to help draft their proposals.

[madfloridian]

I never stop being amazed at how much influence Bill Gates and other billionaires have on education right now.

Think about it. It's an amazing thing, really. Gates and his foundation must have known just how to phrase and word those applications for the Race to the Top grants.

Race to Top: Gates Backs a Bunch of Winners

Several of the states that won grants in the federal Race to the Top competition received financial help from a well-known source: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Nine of the 12 winning applicants from a field of 47 over two rounds of the competition were given $250,000 apiece by Gates to support the crafting of their proposals, foundation spokesman Chris Williams confirmed. The contenders that benefited from that largesse were Massachusetts, New York, Florida, the District of Columbia, Georgia, North Carolina, Ohio, and Rhode Island in round two of the competition, and Tennessee in round one. The other three winners —Delaware, Hawaii, and Maryland—landed in the winners' circle without money from Gates.

Gates chose to help states that were in "good strategic alignment" with the foundation on key issues, Williams explained. The philanthropy has been a big supporter of charter schools, the adoption of common academic standards, and new approaches to evaluating and compensating teachers, among other goals. Williams noted that Gates was not involved in the process of actually crafting state Race to the Top proposals; the money instead helped states seek the technical assistance they needed to do that from outside providers.

Charter schools, national standards, and merit pay. In fact that is the very agenda that Arne Duncan adopted, it was the Bill Gates agenda.

Arne Duncan has adopted Bill Gates education "reform" plans.

Gates' plan:

At least according to Leonie Haimson in the Huffington Post. Haimson describes how Bill Gates, and the Gates Foundation, are on a path towards completely dismantling public education and replacing it with a privatized system in which tax-funded profits go to big business.

..."The Gates Foundation, endowed with $35 billion, has already spent billions promoting Gates' personal agenda: the proliferation of charter schools. Gates also promotes linking teacher evaluation and compensation to standardized test scores. Spending billions on education might sound good but considering that neither charter schools nor standardized tests stand up to scrutiny, spending billions promoting them is quite dangerous indeed."

Arne's plan:

The U.S. Department of Education under Arne Duncan has bought into the Gates' agenda completely. Former Gates Foundation officials now serve in the department; including Jim Shelton, former education program director for Gates and now Assistant Deputy Secretary for "Innovation and Improvement". Joan Weiss, former COO of the NewSchools Venture Fund - financier of charter schools with Gates' dollars - joined Duncan's ranks heading the Race to the Top program and has since been promoted to Duncan's Chief of Staff.

Not coincidentally, the $4.3 billion Race to the Top program requires states to eliminate caps on charter schools, forcibly close traditional schools, and even mandate wholesale firing of teachers and turning schools over to charter school operators. The Gates Foundation even "helped" states write their applications for Race to the Top funds - changing laws on charter schools and teacher evaluation in exchange for a long-shot gamble on what is essentially bribe money.

That is the Bill Gates who famously said that teachers did not improve after 3 years of teaching.

From Gotham Schools blog:

Garrulous Mr. Gates

Teachers have intrinsic motivation Gates can neither measure nor (apparently) conceive of. I appreciate money, and I’ll say thanks to praise from almost anyone. But I especially treasure it from kids. Last month I told my class I’d miss them. They shouted, “We’ll miss you too!” They asked me if I’d teach them next year. I was honored, far more than by anything Gates could do or say.

But Gates proves things with charts, one of which says:

"Once somebody has taught for three years, their teaching quality does not improve thereafter."

That’s preposterous. Many societies value wisdom and experience, but if they don’t drive test scores, Gates’s charts are unaffected.

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. Isn't he also funding this value added nonsense in L.A.?

Bill the college dropout. If he wasn't rich, he'd have zero credibility.

[Hannah Bell]

3. yes, he funded a foundation that paid for the analyst from RAND.

[madfloridian]

6. It's amazing how they channel the funding....

to get the outcomes they want. :hi:

[Hannah Bell]

7. i think the whole movement is basically carried by less than 100 people.

who have a boatload of money.

when you start looking at the players -- it's all connected.

[madfloridian]

12. Very good point. Few players, funneled money. Power. Effective indeed.

It's turning out that many many oppose this, not just teachers. But it does matter because the media has taken up the cause.

With that much money and friend Arne at the DOE...it would only take a few people doing it.

[zazen]

2. reviewing texts at this level is a ritualistic exercise

There are so many "extratextual factors" that go into the decision. The proposal becomes the document that enables funders post-hoc to justify why they rejected or selected an applicant.

One can never address all of their criteria adequately in the space allotted (and because the criteria are usually incoherently written--one of the new RFAs from the US Dept of Ed last year was hands down the worst RFP/RFA I'd seen in 17 years. My teenage daughter would have been embarrassed to have written it). You're set up to fail, or win, depending on the ultimate whims of the program officers. The whole "points" issue is bogus.

NIH is a little more fair.

NSF can be, if their competition doesn't have a lot of political scrutiny.

I've worked with a few GF "consultants" before, and I certainly wasn't impressed. Maybe I was just unlucky in the folks who were on the team, the ones who stuck me with all the work, all the lit review, and all the writing and conceptual work. The consultants didn't "help" anyone more than they just demonstrated by giving the money that they were supporting the efforts and that the recipients were willing to follow the Gates model.

[rucky]

4. This isn't too different from Dick Cheney's Energy Commission.

Private interests writing policy, and set to reap the benefits down the road (computers & Microsoft software licenses for every kid!)

[MichiganVote]

5. This needs to be said. Bill Gates is an asshole. Got it? Remember it.

[Hannah Bell]

8. +100.

[Raster]

11. I could not agree more. Gates altruism ALWAYS has ulterior motives.

Gates modus operandi since the early MSFT days is to use anything he can to his best interests, for better or worse for everyone else.

Bill Gates = mildly sociopathic, few business scruples and a rich daddy.

[LWolf]

9. I'm not surprised.

I have to point this out, though:

When, during the Bush administration, I pointed out the connections between the Bush family, text book publishers, and consulting companies benefiting from the "School Improvement Plans" mandated by NCLB, DU was outraged.

When you point out the connections between Duncan, Obama, Gates, Broad, and RTTT, and Obama's "blueprint" for education, how many step forward? A few. How many more will defend it because it happens on Obama's watch?

[MadHound]

10. Nice to see that the universe is unchanging. Bill Gates is still a scum sucking asshole.

Still wanting to control the universe in some shape or fashion.