I recently learned about an amazing new website that shows the commitment of private foundations to charter schools: http://www.erinproject.org/foundation. The website was created by the John and Laura Arnold Foundation. John Arnold is a Texas billionaire who has given a lot of money to Michelle Rhee for her campaign to diminish the teaching profession and privatize public education. The foundation has created a truly astonishing website from which you can learn about funding for charter schools and other initiatives that promote corporate reformers policies. There are a few references to research, but none of the research listings is comprehensive or balanced.

If you are concerned about the creeping privatization of U.S. education, the Arnold Foundation’s list will make you even more concerned. Indeed, it may persuade you that the issue is not “creeping” but “galloping.” In years past, the foundation world devoted its resources to goals that the U.S. Department of Education and other federal agencies neglected. No more, now the federal government and the foundations are on the same page.