For more on this subject see
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Business-Managed Democracy‘Business-managed democracies are those in which the political and cultural 
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Reference: Erik W. Robelen, ‘Gates Learns to Think Big’, Education Week, 11 October, 2006; June Kronholz, ‘Education Battle Brews in Washington State’, Wall Street Journal, 4 October, 2004; ‘Gates Gives $1 Million to Pro-Charter Effort’, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 14 October, 2004; Paul T. Hill, ‘Bill and Melinda Gates Shift from Computers in Libraries to Reform in High Schools’, Education Next, Winter, 2006, p. 49.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation promotes the standard business agenda of ‘rigorous’ curriculum and instruction, assessments and accountability, as well as market competition between schools and the establishment of charter schools.
Reference: Paul T. Hill, ‘Bill and Melinda Gates Shift from Computers in Libraries to Reform in High Schools’, Education Next, Winter, 2006; Erik W. Robelen, ‘Gates Learns to Think Big’, Education Week, 11 October, 2006.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is worth some $30 billion and gives away over a billion dollars each year, mainly in education, so it is particularly influential in education policy. It accounts for a quarter of all philanthropic donations in the school education sector. It distributes much of this money to schools but increasingly it is funding groups promoting particular types of school reform, what the Foundation calls “advocacy work”.
Reference: Paul T. Hill, ‘Bill and Melinda Gates Shift from Computers in Libraries to Reform in High Schools’, Education Next, Winter, 2006, p. 50.
The Gates Foundation Tom Vander Ark, head of the education section of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, “envisions a system in which public authorities oversee schools but do not run them, and Gates Foundation money is directed towards projects that fit that vision… Schools would receive public support only if they performed and parents chose them.”
Reference: Jia Lynn Yang, ‘He's at the Head of the Class’, Fortune, 19 February, 2007; Lynell Hancock, ‘School's Out’, The Nation, 9 July, 2007.
The Foundation donated $125 million to New York schools, to reform schools so as to bring “a CEO mentality to education… We’re converting the role of the principal into a CEO role…”
Reference: Lynn Olson, ‘U.S. Urged to Reinvent It Schools’, Education Week, 20 December, 2006; New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce, ‘Tough Choices or Tough Times’, National Center on Education and the Economy, December 2006, p. 16.
The Gates Foundation is a major funder of the National Centre on Education and the Economy (NCEE) which set up the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce. It funded a report by the Commission that called for schools to be run by independent private contractors rather than school districts. School districts would write and oversee performance contracts for the schools that the contractors would have to meet.
Reference: Erik W. Robelen, ‘Gates Learns to Think Big’, Education Week, 11 October, 2006; June Kronholz, ‘Education Battle Brews in Washington State’, Wall Street Journal, 4 October, 2004; ‘Gates Gives $1 Million to Pro-Charter Effort’, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 14 October, 2004; Carla Rivera, ‘Gates Foundation Gives L.A. Charter School Group $1.8 Million’, Los Angeles Times, 20 September, 2006.
The Gates Foundation gave $135 million to promote and fund charter schools between 2000 and 2004. It has provided funds for the expansion of KIPP schools to high school level. It gave $1.8 million to Green Dot Public Schools in Los Angeles in 2006 for five new charter schools. The Foundation has also given $30 million to NewSchools Venture Fund for developing charter schools.
Reference: Erik W. Robelen, ‘Gates, Broad to Push Education in Presidential Campaign’, Education Week, 2 May, 2007
In addition the Foundation and the Broad Foundation teamed up in 2007 for a $60 million “Strong American Schools” campaign to ensure that education was a strong election issue and to promote strong curriculum standards, standardised testing and merit-based pay for teachers. The Foundation funds various advocacy groups including:  Links
See also: Foundations | Walton Family Foundation | Dick and Betsy DeVos Foundation
© 2009 Sharon Beder
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The Corporate Capture of Childhood
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