The New York Times reports that Rupert Murdoch’s venture into education technology is “nearing an inglorious end.”
News Corporation, controlled by Rupert Murdoch, said on Wednesday that it would take a $371 million write-down on the education division and would move to wind down the production of tablets for schoolchildren, a key part of the unit’s offering.
Moreover, News Corporation’s chief executive, Robert Thomson, said in an earnings call with analysts that the company was in an “advanced stage of negotiations” with a potential buyer for the remaining education business.
Together, the moves highlight the difficulty that has confronted News Corporation and others looking to move teaching into the digital age, relying on the Internet and tablets to update traditional curriculums.
Few initiatives possessed the prominence of Amplify, which grew out of a nearly five-year-old acquisition of a testing software maker that became a small but visible part of News Corporation. And it gained a prominent leader in Mr. Klein, who oversaw New York City’s public schools under Michael R. Bloomberg and was known for pushing technology — sometimes controversially — into the city’s education system….
Yet the rollouts to various schools have been marred by problems, from malfunctioning tablets to slower-than-expected sales. In a note to Amplify employees sent on Wednesday, Mr. Klein said that many school districts lacked the necessary Internet connections.
To that end, he wrote, Amplify will stop marketing the tablet and will no longer accept new customers, though it will continue to support existing subscribers.
“This move will allow us to focus our efforts on the growth and success of our digital curriculum and assessment products,” he wrote.
The division is now in talks with “an outside investor” who would most likely be backed by the unit’s existing management.
“As positive as this relationship has been, Amplify and News Corp. both believe it is time to explore new and exciting strategic opportunities, working with partners who share a deep understanding of what it takes to be successful in education,” Mr. Klein added.
Apparently, the Murdoch corporation lacked the “deep understanding of what it takes to be successful in education.” According to multiple reports, Murdoch invested $1 billion in Amplify. With losses mounting every year, the initiative was impossible to sustain.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I guess the ripe plum has rotted on the tree.
http://ed2worlds.blogspot.com/2014/03/remarks-at-launch-of-50-myths-lies.html?m=1
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And who is going to want to buy this very sour, rotted lemon?
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Well, there’s always Pearson.
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TAGO!
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I’d chortle now with schadenfreude, yet I still should weep,
For all that Klein and Bloomberg sowed, they never got to reap.
Perhaps in time the woes they wrought upon our heads will find
Their route, as karma works its way, to them and all their kind.
Let Bloomberg, with his billions, and let Murdoch, with his mire,
Beware! Let Cuomo’s devilry be met with righteous ire!
Let Michelle Rhee not posture more, while spouting all her swill.
Let Duncan fear the soldiers who are climbing up the hill!
I’d chortle now with schadenfreude, yet I still must weep,
For all the trash they threw at us, we still have got to keep.
We grumble, “Oh, it stinks in here!” We feel that we should puke.
The schools are turned to hell-holes, yet yon Andrew’s still our duke.
And Eli Broad is spending still and hoping still to profit.
And William Gates is long retired, but who would ever know it?
Oh pity now the teachers, for our Chancellor, Farina,
Has ordered that the ratings drop, in time for Andrew’s dinner!
I’d chortle now with schadenfreude, laugh at Murdoch-Klein,
But I can see the two of them will still be doing fine,
When I and other working stiffs are forced to quit our jobs,
So we’ll be scroungers on the streets, while they remain nabobs.
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you’ve got talent-I like it
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“ ‘As positive as this relationship has been, Amplify and News Corp. both believe it is time to explore new and exciting strategic opportunities, working with partners who share a deep understanding of what it takes to be successful in education,’ Mr. Klein added.”
Sounds kinda like some strange open marriage that has come to a polite, but still ignorant end.
Subtext: What it takes “to be successful in education” here is not about the kids. It is about product, sales, presence and position in the market. Until it is TRULY studentsfirst (not turning obligation to learners into opportunity in an edu- market), this sort of
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…thing will continue to happen.
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Karma Baby!!
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I just love this thread.
Yes, karma works its way. ONLY people who GENUINELY care for the welfare of civilization, will fathom the PERMANENT LAW of KARMA in the universe.
THIS is the dichotomous, but dualistic WORLD. Nobody can escape the death, except sufferance. Whoever abuses his/her talent that was built up through many re-incarnated lives in order to inflict or to thwart PAIN/SUFFERANCE on people, will receive many fold of pain/sufferance in the end of his/her life. This is the law of principle + COMPOUNDED (NOT DAILY, WEEKLY, semi- MONTHLY, MONTHLY, quarter-ANNUALLY, BUT every nano-second) interest.
It is not too late to redeem the intentional BAD DEED, these business tycoons should quickly rectify their action in order to revive and restore American Public Education back to where it should be. Back2basic.
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I’m just relieved states/districts didn’t buy it and get ripped off. Good job, school boards.
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Karma
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Rather than schadenfreude, we should feel the loss of millions of dollars spent by already-distressed school districts. This was spurred on by the feds, and we, the taxpayers, are left holding the bag. Textbook example: Guilford County Schools (NC). According to various reports, GCS paid over $16.8 million (of a $30 million Race-To-The-Top grant) to buy Amplify tablets to personalize learning.
That dollar amount does even begin to cover the thousands of wasted hours of instructional time and the thousands of wasted hours of staff development put on by Amplify. It also overlooks the thousands of students who passed through Guilford Co Schools in the last few years who didn’t get the personalized (read machine-based and data-driven) education they were promised.
Oh, what a difference that $17 million could have made! Imagine if it were put toward: reduced class size; better teacher recruitment, training and pay; and classroom supplies that would have been purchased by real educational practitioners, if the decision were theirs.
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Okay, but do school boards and schools have a duty to analyze this stuff? They don’t have to buy everything ed reform is selling. They could learn to say “no” and look for value rather than flash or fads.
It takes a certain amount of courage, because I agree with you that the Obama Administration are promoting what I consider poor decision-making with the “extreme urgency!” language and fear-based appeals to hurry-up-quick join the crowd, but that’s why we’re paying local decision makers. To use THEIR OWN judgment.
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They could hire a local person who understands the local need and available products and is unbiased on product value and actually works for them for a heck of a lot less than 17 million dollars if they need advice. They don’t have to rely on salespeople. They could have a person who is actually on their side, without conflicts or a political agenda. It would be money well spent and there’s no shame in needing advice. No one knows everything.
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They are tasked with deciding what is best for their local district but I’ve never seen a grant program that the district won’t jump on and ask questions later if at all. If there’s an opportunity for more money, they usually bite.
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“Together, the moves highlight the difficulty that has confronted News Corporation and others looking to move teaching into the digital age, . . . ”
Shouldn’t that read “make profits off of moving teaching”? There, fixed that for ya, NYT times propagandist.
“. . . working with partners who share a deep understanding of what it takes to be successful in education,” Mr. Klein added.”
Shouldn’t that read “profitable” instead of “successful”? Fixed it for ya, Klein.
Amazing how the NYT reports this like Murdoch’s motive was purely altruistic instead of profit-based. I know he’s run the NY Post as a loss-leader for decades but he still has one priority: making money while promoting ultra-rightwing conservative quackery through control of media. His history is well-known and documented extensively.
Not a single word about his other profiteering failure InBloom data mining technology either.
Come on, NYT. You embarrass yourself as a water carrier for Rupert Murdoch. But then you’ve been embarrassing yourself ever since the Clinton years.
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I would not be surprised if Murdock sells to UK’s Pearson.
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Good riddance, next?
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Here is VERY IMPORTANT LINK to remind all conscientious people who need to pay attention to the upcoming PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
[We believe:
State budgets must provide adequate, equitable, and sustainable public funding for public education. Everyone must pay their fair share.
Education reform should address long-standing racial and class-based inequities. These include resource distribution, the disproportionate impact of school closures on communities of color, and inequitable disciplinary procedures that feed the school-to-prison pipeline.
THE PUBLIC OWNS PUBLIC EDUCATION. We therefore OPPOSE PRIVATIZATION, centralization of power, and mass school closures.
Education justice demands the intentional inclusion of minority and historically excluded groups in decision making.
Public policies must empower authentic parent engagement and protect student confidentiality.
A robust democracy depends on informed civil discourse and transparent public debate.
We can win when we work together with our grassroots colleagues here, across the state, and around the nation. Collaboration is essential and students are crucial leaders.]
This is an EXTRA wish list from me, a 40 years Canadian immigrant who treasures and is willing to trade my own comfort and personal happiness= joy of learning languages to preserve THE MEANINGFUL DEMOCRACY. Please be on my behalf to demand a reinforced PLATFORM that the president-to-be-elected who endorses with HIS/HER solid pledge to carry out within a certain period of time. For example:
1) To abruptly abandon policy NCLB, RttT, and CCSS effectively before school year beginning in 2016
2) To honor and restore LOCAL CONTROL with CREDENTIAL EDUCATION VETERANS AS LEADERS regarding Public Education Autonomy effectively after ELECTED and sworn in ceremony.
3) To eliminate unlimited campaign spending by replacing with RESTRICTED PUBLIC FUNDED ELECTION for qualified academic and public credential candidates.
4) To restrict on regulation of tax on the wealthy and free trade that harms/destabilizes American economy.
5) To restrict on regulation of education equivalence in foreign degree (paper mills) versus American Public Education System.
6) Last but not least, to promote free Public Education with JOY of learning in K-12 follow through “transparent, valid, and acceptable/appropriate protocol in pedagogy/curriculum.
Welcome to add as many as possible SUGGESTIONS on the platform to be endorsed by any Presidential Candidates. Back2basic
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“The difference between a mosquito and a hedge fund manager (or, education profiteer) is a mosquito will stop sucking blood before it explodes.” Daily Kos
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The trouble with a blood sucker that keeps sucking until it explodes, a lot of other people are hurt who weren’t part of the flock of profiteers. How many innocent lives will these blood suckers destroy?
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Destruction to the nation, communities and Individual lives,
as we, in Diane Ravitch’s living room, sadly recognize.
Education dollars in the pockets of fraudsters and, Wall Street, GDP-dragging financiers, is disastrous for the nation.
Enrollment in on-line schools (which are operated by get-rich schemers and are characterized by abysmal performance), increased 67%, from 2009-2014, in Ohio.
Many of the students, at on-line schools, are in families that are not paying taxes, nor voting. Voters/taxpayers agree to fund education, based on the assumption that the community benefits. If the labor force gains no skills and, the dollars expended for student education, leave the community, there’s no local benefit, thus no willingness to support schooling.
It’s just as the Koch’s want it.
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We use A policy to access our Dibels testing and progress monitoring.
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Sorry Amplify.
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Interesting sidebar to this story: Christopher Cerf, appointed by Governor Christie to NJ Commissioner of Education resigned from that position and now was appointed by Christie as Superintendent of Schools in Newark (a state takeover district). As you can see from this link, he has an involvement in Amplify too:
http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2014/02/11/chris-cerf-and-joel-klein-together-again-at-amplify/#.Vc4JEvmGOW4
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