Gates Foundation to Include All States
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Del.icio.us35 states were left out in the cold when Bill Gates announced that the Gates Foundation would be working with 15 hand picked states for a share of a 4 billion dollar grant from the Department of Education. Needless to say, the left out states had a thing or two to say about the program.
Last July, Bill Gates sat down with lawmakers from 15 states in a conference room in Philadelphia, and he had good news. His foundation would give their states up to $250,000 each, he said, to help them prepare the kind of sparkling grant proposals that could help their states win hundreds of millions of dollars in federal money.
“He said he’d identified 15 states he’d like to work with, and if you’re in this room, you’re one of the 15 states,” said Senator Nancy C. Detert, chairwoman of the Education Committee in the Florida Senate, one of the lawmakers who attended.
Naturally, the 15 states were delighted. But the other 35, not so much. Some officials complained that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was trying to handpick the winners of the Department of Education’s $4 billion grant competition, known as Race to the Top. The National Conference of State Legislatures was one of several groups that relayed objections.
“We expressed concerns that it appeared that Gates people were involved in helping the department pick winners and losers,” said David Shreve, federal affairs counsel at the national conference.
After some reflection, the foundation last month broadened its offer to include all states that are competing for the money and can prove they share the foundation’s views about education reform by signing an eight-point checklist.
Now all states have an equal opportunity to help educate their children. It is necessary that all children in our country have an equal opportunity to earn a top notch education for their future.
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Editor: Melissa Steele is a freelance writer and focuses her research on funding for higher education. She is a graduate of UNLV and endeavors to keep her readers up to date with the most relevant education information.